Traditional Asian Night Market Comes to Westchester

The sounds and tastes of Asian night markets arrive in White Plains on September 23 with dance, music, food and karaok.

The Mooncake Night Market event celebrates the full moon and autumn harvest in ArtsWestchester’s gallery, which will host demonstrations of Chinese calligraphy, lantern making, mooncake stamping, decorative knotting, origami and other crafts.

The evening’s highlights include performances by members of the New York Korean Performing Arts Center; Westchester resident Ariane Kuo, who will play the yangqin, a Chinese dulcimer; Hee Jung Han, who will play a Korean spiked fiddle (haegum); and Li Peng, who will perform bian lian (face-changing), an ancient Chinese dramatic art in which actors wear masks and brightly colored costumes and move to quick, dramatic music.

“It’s the type of program where people can drop by and stay for a half hour or two hours. There is enough to keep attendees occupied for the entire duration of the four-hour event, but if you just want to come in, have a bite to eat and engage in an activity, catch a performance, and leave, you can do that. It’s not a four-hour commitment,” says Aaron Paige, ArtsWestchester’s director of folk and traditional arts programs.

The event is called the Mooncake Night Market because of the harvest moon, which will be full on September 29. Since the full harvest moon is integral to the festivities, it is common for celebrations to occur at night. East Asian traditions that accompany the harvest of rice and wheat include mooncakes, hanging lanterns and storytelling.

In Chinese culture, the full moon symbolizes family reunions. Traditions around the full harvest moon date back more than 2,000 years. Mid-autumn festivals became official Chinese state festivals during the Tang Dynasty (628-907) and in feudal times, Chinese emperors held ceremonies on the night of the 15th day of the eighth lunar month in praise of the moon.

Paige says that ArtsWestchester decided to stage a mid-autumn event to draw attention to an important east Asian family holiday:

“There are several Lunar New Year programs that happen throughout Westchester, but the mid-autumn festival—which is a traditional festival celebrating the importance of the moon and the autumn harvest—is a less recognized event. It’s important to many families across east Asian and southeast Asian cultural traditions,” said Paige.

Night markets have become more popular in the United States, particularly in areas of the country with large Asian immigrant populations. Locally, the largest night market is the Saturday Queens Night Market at the New York Hall of Science in Flushing Meadows Corona Park, but ArtsWestchester wanted to bring the celebration closer to home in Westchester.

The Mooncake Night Market is co-organized by ArtsWestchester, the Greenburgh Evergreen Club and the OCA-Asian Pacific American Advocates Westchester & Hudson Valley Chapter. The program is part of Westchester Roots, a series of events throughout Westchester that celebrate local ethnic populations. The final Westchester Roots performance in October will feature Syrian music in conjunction with Katonah Museum of Art.

The night market runs from 5-9pm at 31 Mamaroneck Ave. in White Plains. General admission tickets are $10 with food from vendors sold separately.

About ArtsWestchester

For more than 50 years, ArtsWestchester has been the community’s connection to the arts. Founded in 1965, it is the largest private not-for-profit arts council in New York State. Its mission is to create an equitable, inclusive, vibrant and sustainable Westchester County in which the arts are integral to and integrated into every facet of life. ArtsWestchester provides programs and services that enrich the lives of everyone in Westchester County. ArtsWestchester helps fund concerts, exhibitions and plays through grants; brings artists into schools and community centers; advocates for the arts; and builds audiences through diverse marketing initiatives. In 1998, ArtsWestchester purchased the nine-story neo-classical bank building at 31 Mamaroneck Avenue which has since been transformed into a multi-use resource for artists, cultural organizations and the community. A two-story gallery is located on the first floor of ArtsWestchester’s historic building on Mamaroneck Avenue. artsw.org