Under the direction of choreographer Lin Hwai-min, Cloud Gate Dance Theatre of Taiwan has been exploring traditional Chinese body disciplines. Songs of the Wanderers (1994), performed at the Adelaide Festival (1998), comes from the practice of meditation. Moon Water (1998), featured at the Sydney 2000 Olympic Arts Festival, owes its movement motives to Tai Chi Tao Yin, a Chi Kung exercise that can be traced back to more than 2000 years ago. Both works have received high acclaim at prominent festivals throughout the world.

In 2001, Lin Hwai-min further explored the possibilities of Tai Chi Tao Yin and martial arts, and created Cursive, with its title derived from Chinese calligraphy. After studying Chinese calligraphy masterpieces, Lin found, despite the differences in styles, all the brush works shared one common element: the focused energy with which the calligraphers "danced" during writing. He asked Cloud Gate dancers to improvise by facing blown-up images of calligraphy. The dancers absorbed the energy, or Chi, of the writer, and imitated the linear "route" of ink, full of lyrical flows and strong punctuations, with rich variations in energy. The exercise produced unimaginable movements, with subtle slow motions and martial-arts-like attacks with powerful energy. These eventually became the movement material for Cursive, a work of stunning beauty that has received rave reviews in Europe and the U.S.

Cursive II, a sequel to Cursive, had its international premiere at the opening of the Melbourne International Arts Festival, right after its world premiere in Taipei in August 2003. The production in Melbourne won both The Age Critics' Award as well as the Festival Patron's Award. Although both Cursive and Cursive II were inspired by the aesthetics of Chinese calligraphy, Cursive II is drastically different from its forerunner. Chinese believe there are five shades of black ink. While Cursive emphasizes the darker blacks with lots of vigorous attacks, Cursive II explores the lighter shades in a meditative mood, evoking the serene quality of porcelain from the Sung Dynasty.

A work of delicate lyricism, Cursive II celebrates the elegance of calligraphy and the power of emptiness. A white floor and white backdrop create a stage that resembles a huge sheet of rice paper. As the dance unfolds, through lighting and slide projection, the color on the backdrop gradually evolves from shining white to different shades of brown, just as ancient calligraphy scrolls aged over the centuries. Cursive II is a study of time.

For the choice of soundscape, Lin Hwai-min has surprised many people by using John Cage's works. Simple and pure string music from the Western avant garde master – himself also a student of Zen Buddhism – engages in a beautiful dialogue with movements developed from Eastern age-old traditional body disciplines. The effect is magical.