Samara Hersch (Lead Artist)
Samara Hersch is a theatre maker, director and teaching artist whose practice explores the intersection of contemporary performance and community engagement. She recently completed her Masters at Das Theatre in Amsterdam. She has an interest in inter-generational discourse and non-hierarchical forms of knowledge sharing. Her recent work, We All Know What’s Happening, made together with Lara Thoms and 7 children from Melbourne, was the recipient of the ZKB Patronage Prize and the Audience Prize at Zürcher Theater Spektakel in 2019, as well as the Green Room Award for Best Contemporary and Experimental Performance in Melbourne. Her recent project Body of Knowledge invites teenagers from around the world to phone into the theatre to have conversations with the adult audience, in order to spark intergenerational and intercontinental exchange around critical issues affecting future generations. Body of Knowledge has toured extensively, including workshop residencies in Hong Kong, Nyon and Singapore in 2020. Her most recent work For the Time Being played at the Auawirleben Festival in Bern and at Münchner Kammerspiele in 2020. Samara was mentored by Bruce Gladwin, from the award-winning theatre company, Back to Back Theatre Co. through the JUMP National Mentorship Program and later worked as a show director on their production of Super Discount (Sydney Theatre Co. and Malthouse Theatre 2013).
Frederick Rodrigues (Creative Technology and 'at home' concept)
Frederick Rodrigues is an Australian media artist based in the Netherlands; focused on social adoption of technology and the subsequent feedback to our perception. Frederick’s medium is also technology; writing code, creating electronics and making systems talk. His work is often collaborative and to this end he is interested in methodologies for collaboration across disparate practices. This approach has allowed Frederick to work with many talented artists across a number of fields, as well as developing solo work.
Cassandra Fumi (Artistic Associate)
Cassandra Fumi is a theatre maker and stage manager who is interested in the collaborative nature of contemporary theatre-making and community engagement particularly with young people and non-perfomers. Recent Stage Management credits include UNWOMAN (THE RABBLE), ANTHEM (Melbourne, Perth & Sydney International Arts Festival), WE ALL KNOW WHAT’S HAPPENING (Cambeltown Arts, Vitalstatistix, Zurich Theater Spectacle, Noorderzon Performing Arts Festival Groningen), BROKEN (Lab Kelpie, fortyfivedownstairs), LONE (THE RABBLE – Arts House), BOOK OF EXODUS P2 (Fraught Outfit Theatreworks), ANGELS IN AMERICA PART 1 & PART 2 (Cameron Lukey & Dirty Pretty Theatre – fortyfivedownstairs). As an Associate Artist, her credits include BODY OF KNOWLEDGE (Performance Space, Sydney), BODY OF KNOWLEDGE @ HOME (Theater Spektakel, Zürich, Kampnagel, Hamburg & Imagetanz, Vienna), TAKE OVER PROGRAM (2020, 2021 – Darebin Arts). As a director: DOG SHOW (Melbourne Fringe Hub – Winner Best Emerging Theatre Ensemble & Falls Festival), THE PLACES YOU’LL GO (Adelaide Fringe – Winner Best Theatre – Week 3), NADJA After André Breton (The Cockpit Theatre & Hornsey Town Hall Arts Centre, London), AN ACT OF SELF-DESTRUCTION (VAULT Festival & Ply Gallery), POKER FACE (Kings Head, London, Trieste & Milan International Arts Festival), Assistant Director to Leticia Caceres on THE HOUSE OF BERNARDA ALBA (Melbourne Theatre Company). www.cassandrafumi.com.
Maria Rößler (Dramaturgy)
Maria Rößler is an independent dramaturg, based in Berlin. She has been working in the field of experimental performing arts for over ten years, on behalf of various international art festivals and other cultural programmes, as well as for multidisciplinary art venues such as Vooruit (Gent) and HAU Hebbel am Ufer (Berlin). As a student of theatre, she assisted artist collectives such as Rimini Protokoll and Lunatiks. Her recent work as a freelance dramaturg includes collaborations with theatre and performance makers such as Nuray Demir, Samara Hersch, Zwoisy Mears-Clarke, the rubberbodies collective, Abhishek Thapar, et al. Maria has repeatedly acted as an advisor for artists graduating from the MA program DAS Theatre at the Amsterdam University of the Arts. From 2013 to 2016, she was involved in the programme development and organisation of the international festival for performing arts “Foreign Affairs” at Berliner Festspiele. She has been a member of the programme board of the Zürcher Theater Spektakel since 2017. mariaroessler.work