YICHENGAO.

WRITING · THEATRE · STORYTELLING

What a story
carries.

A voice, a name, a letter passed from one hand to another. I’m interested in the lives that take shape between what is said and what is heard.

Explore selected work
A mirror and a letter on a dressing table
A dressing table, a mirror, a letter. Concept image for Double Carp.
SELECTED WORK

Stories find their way
through people.

My work moves between the stage, the page and the spaces where an audience encounters a story. Here are a few of those journeys.

A sealed letter beside a mirrorCONCEPT IMAGE

STAGE PLAY · PROSE

Double Carp

A letter opens a world. A borrowed name changes it.

In a Huainan opera troupe, performer Zheng Yousheng writes to Xiang Zhizuo under the name Chen Yu, while fellow performer Chen Yu carries their letters. Across stage and prose, the story follows the desires and silences that gather around the three of them.

“To find a kindred spirit like this would leave me with no regrets in life.”
“If he has found a kindred spirit like this, what am I to do?”

FROM DOUBLE CARP · TRANSLATED FROM CHINESE

Written by Yichen Gao · 2025

STAGE PLAY · SCREEN ADAPTATION

The Perfect
Partner

A paper crane. A recording. Two people on a rooftop.

Xiaoxiao brings a folded crane and a recording to a meeting with Xiaochao. As their conversation unfolds, the space between a public image and a private truth becomes harder to ignore.

“But why was it mine that you remembered wrong? Perhaps I’ve taken the place of one of your Schumanns, and stood in the way of Brahms.”

FROM THE PERFECT PARTNER · TRANSLATED FROM CHINESE

Written by Yichen Gao · 2025

A figure carries a letter down a narrow passageCONCEPT IMAGE

CURATORIAL PROPOSAL · DIGITAL EXPERIENCE

Who Gets to Sign
the Letter?

Follow a letter from the hand that writes it to the voice that describes it.

An exhibition proposal inspired by Double Carp, tracing the letter through writing, performance, delivery and interpretation. Its digital companion invites visitors to move through the story one station at a time.

Visit the digital companion ↗

ANOTHER WAY THROUGH

INTERACTIVE STORY · SHORT FILM

Before You Forward

A digital adaptation of The Perfect Partner unfolds through six moments: a fragment of a recording, a paper crane, the full conversation and an exhibition caption. The same sentence takes on different meanings as more of the conversation comes into view.

Source play and adaptation direction by Yichen Gao · Interface and film produced with a creative team · 2026

ABOUT

Yichen Gao
高亦晨

I write about the distance between a person and the story told about them.

Yichen Gao is a writer working across theatre, fiction and curatorial storytelling. She studies dramatic writing at the Central Academy of Drama and has worked in theatre publicity, where she has written for performances and their audiences.

Her practice returns to letters, objects and gestures: small things that carry a story from one person to another.