makes

I make work through conversation with people and place. Working with words &/as movement to draw together seemingly unrelated constellations of bodies and thought, my practice has taken form as site-specific dances with large ensembles for libraries; one-to-ones in broom cupboards, carparks and nightclubs; participatory walks and online artworks in response to the decline of biodiversity across the UK; a giant screen-dance for the ballroom of London’s Southbank; as a range of creative/critical writings, research and discourse series - online, in print and in person - as podcasts, workshops, alt- school offers, symposia, artist and community gatherings. Each encounter is approached as part of an expanded choreo-poetic and dramaturgical practice and ongoing enquiry into crip/queer time, experience and expertise; touch; care and loss.

What I do (or, how I am) is deliberately collaborative, deeply dyspraxic, unashamedly soft, unapologetically gentle and (quiet/ly) queer. I am fascinated by the ways differing ideas and experiences can come together, via old/new relationship/s, mutual curiosity, companionship and researchfullness to dream into - and activate - ways that we might live (and die) together, differently.

In its long-term, long/cross-form, slow, cyclical, often slippery, multi-modal, polyphonic, neuroqueer nature - forever shifting in shape and feeling - some/a lot of what I am with and do might go unseen, appear intangible, illegible.

Before finding my way ‘late’ into dance, poetry, performance, I worked in hairdressers; in pubs, clubs, book and pet shops - briefly in fashion, modelling - and for a while making the sockets that telephones plug into. Hospitality, craft and care have always been core to what what I do.

I have shared/presented artistic works throughout the UK and internationally including: Unlimited Festival Southbank Centre; LeithLate Edinburgh; Dance Base at Edinburgh Fringe; Dance International Glasgow and Take Me Somewhere, Glasgow; Dansens Hus Stockholm; E-Motional Romania; Cruising for Art at Anti-Festival Finland and In Between Time Bristol; Light Moves Ireland; Luminate Festival and StAnza International Poetry Festival, Scotland and I’m With You for Room of Requirement Berlin.

As a performer, I have worked with Helena Hunter and Pacitti Company; Rosemary Lee; Janice Parker; DIVE Queer Party and as a guest writer in James Ley’s Love Song for Lavender Menace at The Lyceum, Edinburgh.

My published writings feature in: In Other Words from Metal, the Live Art Development Agency and Necessity; with Lucy Cash in Dostoyevsky Wannabe Cities, Glasgow Edition edited by Colin Herd and Ruthie Kennedy; in Contact Quarterly with Jess Curtis and Claire Cunningham; in Dance, Disability, Law - Invisible Difference from Intellect Books and with Caroline Bowditch in Access All Areas - Live Art & Disability from the Live Art Development Agency.

I was co-editor of the Embodiment, Interactivity and Digital Performance edition of the Journal of Dance and Somatic Practices and more recently for Fevered Sleep | Love and Not Knowing with Laura Cull Ò’Maoilearca - published in 2024 - as part of Performance Research Books, Inside Performance Practice series.

Over time I've described myself as maker, curator, facilitator. At heart, I would say I'm a poet and dramaturg/e - engaged in choreographic thinking. I am a regular companion in practice to other artists and arts organisations - as a practice and dramaturg/e, facilitator, writer, researcher and in artist support.

I have been a long-term associate of the UK based performance company Fevered Sleep and Janice Parker projects, as well as Associate Artist at Dance Base Scotland, and Dance Digital, England.

I have also held roles as Head of Learning & Research with Candoco Dance Company, Artist Support Programme Facilitator with The Work Room, Glasgow and currently as Research Associate with Claire Cunningham’s Professorship at HZT (the Inter-Univeristy Dance Centre) in Berlin.

Over time I've described myself as A maker, curator, facilitaTOR - At heart, IWOULD SAY I'm a poet & dramaturg/e engaged in choreographic thinking.

A quiet creature in a loud blouse.

Wherever I am, whatever I do, I seek to be gentle, generous, generative. I attempt to cultivate kindness, compassionate criticality, curiosity.

COMPANIONING artists in the myriad ways they reveal wisdoms for living.

Site Design with Valerie Reid | Image: Lucy Cash