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Hanna Cormick
Host/Artist
Hanna Cormick is a performance artist, theatre-maker and curator, with a background in physical theatre, dance, circus and interdisciplinary art. Cormick’s practice has spanned many genres and continents over twenty years, including as a founding member of Australian interdisciplinary art-science group Last Man To Die, one half of Parisian cirque-cabaret duo Les Douleurs Exquises, and as a mask artist in France and Indonesia. She is a graduate of Ecole Internationale de Théâtre Jacques Lecoq (Paris), Charles Sturt University’s Acting degree, NIDA's Young Actor's Studio, Ecole des Arts Chinois du Spectacle (Paris) and has trained with The Grotowski Center (ARTA, Paris), Pan Théâtre/Roy Hart Centre (Malerargues), and Per Brahe (Bali).
Her recent work centres around disability activism and includes The Mermaid (2018 Art, Not Apart; 2018 Ainslie+Gorman; 2020 Sydney Festival), Canary (2019-2020 worldwide locations for Climate Change Theatre Action), Little Monsters (2019 Art, Not Apart), Theatre & Plagues (2020 online), the current work-in-progress theatre work Zebracorn, and as co-curator of Eastern Riverina Arts' online disability arts festival Platform LIVE(2020). In 2018 she was a finalist for the National Award for Disability Leadership (Arts) and the ACT Chief Minister’s Inclusion Award (Young Leader). Her current practice is a reclamation of body through radical visibility.
Matt Shilcock
Host/Artist
Matt Shilcock is a South Australian based contemporary dance theatre artist. Matt spent much of his youth in a wheelchair before learning to walk at the age of fifteen.
Matt has a Certificate III & IV in Fitness and Personal Training and is a 2nd Kyu in Budo Taijutsu and specialised weaponry, with a strength in adapting mobility aids to weaponised use. His passion for fitness and health extends from his own accomplishments in transitioning from a fulltime wheelchair user to his current practices in dance, fitness and martial arts.
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Matt began performing in 2009 and has since professionally engaged with companies across Australia including Murmuration, No Strings Attached Theatre for Disability, Restless Dance Theatre, Kaldor Public Arts, and internationally with Mass Box (China), Touch Compass (NZ), Full Radius (USA), Candoco (UK), Independence (UK), FreeWill Theatre (HK) and the Van L Dance Company (UK).
Liz Lea
Host/Artist
Liz has 30 years experience as a nationally and internationally recognised dance artist, choreographer and producer. She has been commissioned in India, UK, Australia, South Africa, Singapore and USA. Liz was named a 2018 ACT Dance Artist of the Year and in was the 2017 ACT Artist of the Year.
Liz directed Canberra Dance Theatre for 6 years and directs two Festivals - DANscienCE where dance and science meet and BOLD, which celebrates the legacy of dance across all identities. BOLD III is due to run in March 2021. Liz has extensive experience working with people with intellectual disabilities and sits on the National Portrait Gallery’s Access Advisory Group. Liz has presented two TEDx performance talks (2014 and 2018).
In 2019 she toured her one woman show RED, directed One Giant Leap, a cross community project celebrating the 50th Anniversary of the Moon landing and worked in Singapore as part of an Asialink Residency with Maya Dance Theatre and DADC, a company of dancers who live with Down Syndrome.
Liz worked for Ausdance ACT for 4 years, becoming the Creative Director in 2019. In 2020 she toured RED to the UK and was Movement Director for a new production in Kuwait. Liz is a member of the ACT Minister’s Creative Council, is represented by Karen Gallagher and Associates and directs The Australian Talented Project.
Brett Olzen
Auslan Interpreter
Brett is a Child of Deaf Adults and the only native-speaking Auslan interpreter in Canberra. During the last 20 years Brett Olzen has worked as an interpreter with Territory and Federal Government, with Prime Ministers and the Dalai Lama, and at the ACT Chief Minister’s Inclusion Awards.
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Brett worked with Canberra Institute of Technology for over ten years and advocated for inclusion and access for Deaf students and has frequently volunteered to interpret for fundraising events, community events, sports clubs and church groups, and worked outside regular business hours including emergency call outs.
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Some of the events and programs that Brett has made more accessible and inclusive include Rebus Theatre performances, The BOLD Festival, a dance program at Belconnen Arts Centre, computer access programs, and guided tours at the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra.
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Brett Olzen was a finalist for the Life Time Achievement in Supporting People with Disability award at the 2019 ACT Chief Minister’s Inclusion Awards.