Caroline Walkup, FCLC 2026

Major: Dance & New Media Digital Design

Bio: Caroline Walkup was born in Hunan, China and raised in Columbia, SC. She is an Undergraduate Summer Research & Creative Practices Grant recipient, exploring how costume design conveys the complexity of self-identification as a Chinese adoptee. She has trained with renowned artists including Hope Boykin, Ronald K. Brown, Earl Mosley and many others throughout her dance journey. Her interdisciplinary artistic works highlight transracial/-cultural identities and empower the voices of adoptees.

Title of Research: The Noodle House Dilemma: An Investigation of Adoptee Culture and Self-Identification Through Costume Design

Mentor: Stephan Apicella-Hitchcock, Visual Arts

Abstract: Fashion nonverbally communicates a sense of self and cultural identity. This project uses costume design to investigate my birth culture and identity as a Chinese adoptee. The dilemma of having to justify my identity to others while I’m defining it for myself has inspired the costume’s design. This design project is grounded in research about the psychological and emotional effects of adoption, addressed in Nancy Verrier’s "The Primal Wound", and the evolution of China’s One-Child Policy which resulted in the mass displacement of Chinese children. The costume’s design externalizes the internal conflicts of navigating self-identification as a transnational adoptee. 

As a Dance and New Media Digital Design double major, I designed these costumes for my choreographic work, "the Red Thread". Each costume comprised three parts: a base layer (wide-leg pants and a tank top) and an outer silk chiffon shirt. I created 18 pieces total for six dancers. The cultural symbolism of colors within Chinese and Western cultures informed the color palette. The base layers of the costumes had two variations, where the exterior and lining colors were reversed. Each dancer wore a green silk chiffon shirt with white frog closures. The base tank top and chiffon shirt collars combined to form a mandarin collar. Alone, each shirt’s collar would be incomplete, symbolizing how adoptees are complete because of our cultural intersectionality and identities. "the Red Thread" and costumes premiered in October 2025 at The Ailey School and was performed at the Dance Theatre of Harlem’s Sunday Matinee Series in November 2025.