DAY 1: UNSCRIPTED #03

The Art of Storytelling
with Brian Hioe & An Rong Xu — featuring and moderated by Darice Chang — a Day 1: Unscripted conversation

In a city full of stories, who gets to decide which ones the world actually hears?

For the next Day 1: Unscripted, we're bringing together Brian Hioe, An Rong Xu, and Darice Chang for a candid conversation about storytelling in Taiwan — how stories build identity for a city, a person, and a brand, and what gets lost or found in translation along the way.

This isn't a panel or a lecture.

What We'll Explore
1. Storytelling for a place — Taiwan after dark: who gets to tell the story of a city, and how it travels globally
2. Storytelling for yourself — drag, persona, and personal branding: turning identity into a public narrative
3. Storytelling for companies — what brands can learn from artists about authenticity, voice, and audience

Questions We'll Dig Into

• Who gets to tell the story of a city, and how does that story travel globally?
• What turns a place, a scene, or a subculture into something outsiders want to understand?
• How does personal identity and persona become a vehicle for representation?
• Where's the line between authentic storytelling and performance?
• What can brands learn from independent journalists, filmmakers, and photographers about voice and trust?
• How does language and format shape which stories actually reach a global audience?
• What responsibility comes with representing a city or community on screen or on the page?

Brian, An Rong, and Darice come at these questions from very different angles — one through independent journalism and translation, one through photography and film, and one through drag, production, and on-camera storytelling.

Bring your questions, your own experiences with storytelling and identity, or simply an opinion you're willing to have challenged. Then we'll open the conversation to the room.

About Brian Hioe (丘琦欣)
Brian Hioe is the founding editor of New Bloom Magazine, a Taiwan-focused outlet covering politics and youth culture. He is a journalist, translator, and novelist, author of Taipei at Daybreak, with writing that has appeared in The Diplomat and The Guardian. He also DJs as DJ Brainless, bringing the same instinct for scene and subculture to the dance floor that shapes his writing on the page.

About An Rong Xu
An Rong Xu is a NYC/Taipei-based photographer and director whose work has appeared in The New York Times, TIME, and National Geographic. His visual storytelling moves between documentary and intimate portraiture, often returning to questions of diaspora, identity, and place. He is currently working on his first feature-length short.

About Darice Chang (張丹輝 / Dan Dan Demolition) — they/them
Darice Chang is a Taipei-based producer, creative director, and drag artist featured in Midnight Asia, as well as a writer, filmmaker, and activist exploring gender, diaspora, and representation.

Their production and journalism work includes projects with the Presidential Office, Academia Sinica, and the Office of Audrey Tang, as well as coverage of Taiwan's COVID-19 response. Their writing and on-camera work have also appeared in Bon Appétit and Food & Wine.

They will join the conversation as a speaker and moderate the discussion.

About Day 1: Unscripted
Candid conversations with people who build.

Unscripted brings a small group together with founders, operators, and people with strong perspectives to talk openly about the decisions and realities behind building something.

No presentations. No rehearsed answers. The room is part of the conversation.

Attendance is limited to Day 1 All-Access members and invited guests. Registrations that don't meet either criteria may be declined.

Unscripted is included with Day 1 All-Access membership, with ongoing access to curated conversations, founder gatherings, and member events.

Event Details
No entry fee, one drink minimum.

Full bar on site, including non-alcoholic options (Eben kombucha, coffee, Coke, Sprite, sparkling water) alongside wine and our ube cream special.

Come for the conversation. Stay for the people.