Daniel Riley, a Wiradjuri man from Western NSW, is the current Artistic Director of Australian Dance Theatre (ADT). He is the sixth Artistic Director in the company’s 59-year history, and the first Blak artist to hold the position. Riley currently sits on the inaugural Creative Australia First Nations Board and the Board of Tandanya National Aboriginal Cultural Institute. He is an Honorary Fellow through the Faculty of Fine Arts (Dance) at the University of Melbourne and previously served as an Associate on the Board of A New Approach (ANA), Australia’s leading cultural think tank.

Daniel began his contemporary dance journey at QL2 (previously Quantum Leap), ACT, and since graduating from Queensland University of Technology (QUT) in 2006 has danced for Leigh Warren & Dancers (2005–06); New Movement Collective, UK (2014); Fabulous Beast Dance Theatre, Ireland (2014); Chunky Move (2019); Bangarra Dance Theatre (2007-2018) and Australian Dance Theatre (2022–23).

Under his directorship at Australian Dance Theatre, Daniel has worked on various initiatives to support the next generation of First Nations dancers, choreographers and artists. Chief among these is the multi-award-winning BLAK FUTURES, which was delivered by ADT in 2024 in collaboration with BlakDance and Adelaide Festival.

Daniel has created works for ADT, ILBIJERRI Theatre Company, Louisville Ballet, Victorian College of the Arts, Melbourne International Arts Festival, Dancenorth, Bangarra Dance Theatre, Sydney Dance Company, Third Row Dance Company, QL2 Dance and QUT among others.

Daniel has been nominated at the Australian Dance Awards (2010, 2013) and for the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Deadly Awards (2010, 2012 and 2013).

Jasmin is a contemporary dancer, choreographer and director, a Tagalaka Aboriginal woman with Settler, Chinese and Hungarian ancestry.

Jasmin spent 12 years with Bangarra Dance Theatre, choreographing one major work for the company during her tenure, MACQ, on the 1816 Appin Massacres under Governor Macquarie which toured Australian capital cities, regional Australia and Germany.

Other works include: No Remittance for Legs on the Wall and Choice Cut for Yirramboi festival, which made its proscenium arch debut at Ryerson Theatre, CA, at Toronto’s Fall For Dance North Festival, 2019.

In 2021 Jasmin choreographed The Complication of Lyrebirds (Sydney Festival; Campbelltown Arts Centre). This work was also supported Native Earth Theatre Company, Toronto, and later in 2023 for Sydney dance Co’s INDance season. In 2021 Jasmin co directed Value For Money for GUTS Dance alongside Sara Black which has toured nationally.

Jasmin created Given Unto Thee for Sydney Dance Company’s New Breed 2021 program, and was lead performer, movement director and associate writer in a work by S Shakthidharan: 宿 (stay). She most recently choreographed The Cord which premiered at New Annual festival in 2024.

Jasmin is the First Nations artist-curator at Critical Path where she curates a diverse program for First Nations choreographers. Jasmin was the inaugural Balnaves’ Artist in Residence at Sydney Dance Company in 2024.

In 2025 Jasmin premiered her highly anticipated work Preparing Ground, with Marilyn Miller and Katina Olsen, and later in 2025 will premiere Two Blood with Daniel Riley and S.Shakthidharan at Australian Dance Theatre.

Jasmin is co Dance Practice Lead at NAISDA Dance College, and serves on the board of AIME Mentoring.

S. Shakthidharan is an Australian storyteller with Sri Lankan heritage and Tamil ancestry. His plays Counting and Cracking (“One of the great Australian plays” - The Guardian), The Jungle and the Sea and The Wrong Gods have won critical, commercial and community acclaim and toured extensively. Gather Up Your World In One Long Breath, with Powerhouse Publishing, is his debut book. It will be accompanied by a year-long, companion artwork with the Museum.

Shakthi has a feature film, plays, TV series and multi-disciplinary works in development. He’s the Director of Kurinji, was previously Director of Co-Curious, and was Founder and Artistic Director of CuriousWorks from 2003-2018. Shakthi is a Creative Australia and Sidney Myer Fellow, and a recipient of the Phillip Parson’s and Kirk Robson awards.

Brianna Kell is a dancer, choreographer and educator.

Brianna is the current Artistic Associate of Australian Dance Theatre, she was thrilled to join Australian Dance Theatre on Kaurna Yerta in 2022 as a company artist with Artistic Director Daniel Riley. Performing in The Third, Savage, The Hum with the Australian Ballet and Marrow. Brianna Co-directed A Quiet Language the 60th anniversary work for Adelaide Festival and enjoys working closely with Daniel Riley and the company artists.

Brianna was commissioned to create her first full length work The Other Side, with powerhouse musical duo Party Dozen. Premiering February 2023 at Campbelltown Arts Centre.

Brianna’s commissions include NOW/AGAIN for ADT's Cultivate: One 2023,_ Narcifixion_ with director Anton for Dance Bites 2021, In Situ commissioned by Dance Makers Collective for Sydney Festival 2021, Rise co-choreographed on Wurundjeri Land with Daniel Riley 2020, Fly by Night with radio producer Mike Williams, The Wave Beneath Us for the VCA 2019.

Brianna spent 2020/21 as a specialist contemporary Dance Tutor at the University of Melbourne VCA coordinating subjects for choreography, contemporary technique, and major production whilst simultaneously completing her Honours.

Brianna’s practice investigates environments, connection, and the digestion of time, with a curiosity for theatrical/ situational observations. Brianna is a fan of whimsy and has a chronic health condition which she deems chronic and iconic.

House of Vnholy (Matthew Adey) is an experimental multi-discipline artist and designer based in Adelaide/Melbourne. HØV creates visual and immersive experiences with light, object and body through live performance and large scale installation. HØV investigates the spectacle of the visual image and the transcendence and meditation of time and space, subverting the contemporary spectacle through new media and technology. Curiosity of the ephemeral experience of light and its endless possibilities it can create, HØV’s work is imbedded in transformative experience for any willing participant.

Over the past 14 years House of Vnholy has created several commissions for festivals across Australia including ECSTATIC UTOPIAN FANTASY at Illuminate Adelaide and LIFELESS, a solo exhibition at Staff Only in 2025, DsO1.2 at Now or Never in 2024, SEEP at Illuminate Adelaide 2022, FOREVERFALL at RISING Melbourne 2021, MONO- at the Adelaide Fringe Festival in 2014, HOMME Darebin Speakeasy for the Melbourne Fringe Festival in 2015, MYTH 02 – The Orator premiering at Sydney’s Underbelly Arts Festival in 2017, SEER at the 2018 Next Wave Festival.

HØV worked with winter festival Dark Mofo as Senior Lighting Director 2017-2019 and now works with RISING Melbourne as leading event designer, delivering major projects across the festival since its inception in 2021.

HØV has worked in collaboration as a production designer with Australian Dance Theatre, Gravity and Other Myths, Australian Ballet, Maxine Doyle, Stephanie Lake, Melanie Lane, Antony Hamilton, Atlanta Eke and Amrita Hepi.

James Howard is a Jaadwa composer, producer and sound artist with a contemporary music practice that establishes connection to his First Nations culture, Country, and personal identity. His creative work informs a continuous process of cultural reclamation, often layering personal, family, and community narratives into long-form, improvised ambient and electronic works.

Drawing on a sonic palette featuring voice, synthesisers, archival samples, and field recordings, Howard’s compositions are driven by the potential for First Nations storytelling to be realised through contemporary electronic arrangements. In 2021 he released his first album, Variations on Country, followed the next year by the mini-album, Music from ‘The Third’. In 2025 he released his second full-length album, Marrow, adapted from the soundtrack he composed for Australian Dance Theatre’s 2024 production of the same name.

Howard has worked with a range of creative organisationsincluding Australian Dance Theatre, Bangarra Dance Theatre, RISING Festival, YIRRAMBOI, and the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art.

His recent live performance project with Alice Skye and Michael Julian, Gikilangangu Wergaia won Best in Music at the 2024 Melbourne Fringe Festival. In 2022 he was awarded his PhD (Indigenous Arts and Culture), from the Faculty of Fine Art and Music, University of Melbourne, for his thesis titled Composing Cultural Reclamation: Reconnecting to an Indigenous Cultural Heritage through a Music Practice.

Andy Chia (MA) is a Director, Artist/Musician, Producer, Husband, and Father. He is the first professionally trained Chinese Flutist in Singapore and the first non-native Chinese to receive a Masters of Arts in Dizi performance from the Shanghai Conservatory of Music as a National Arts Council scholar. Andy is also the Co-founder, Artistic Director, Producer, and resident artist of SAtheCollective Ltd (A Major Grant Company supported by the National Arts Council, Singapore).

Andy’s pursuit is in the evolving relationship between Humans, Nature, and Technology. His study uses shamanic and ritualistic teachings alongside interdisciplinary and intercultural manners in search of a harmonious, unified existence between all three entities on the planet we call home. His art has been described as hypermodernism, drawing from ethnic roots yet modern.

Besides an extensive resume as an Artist and producer in the local scene with the Singapore International Festival of the Arts, National Gallery Singapore, Singapore Chinese Cultural Centre; Andy is also well connected with international artists, having been commissioned by major festivals such as OZAsia, Sydney Festival, AngelicA Festival Internazionale di Musica across Asia, Europe, and North America.

Zachary Lopez, born on Meanjin and grew up in the suburbs of north Brisbane, is an artist working with dance and choreography. An Australian of Filipino heritage, his practice attempts to reimagine the experience of the ‘other’ with focus on identity dualism and draws from the experiential, myth and archive.

In 2022, he joined Australian Dance Theatre (ADT) on Kaurna Yerta as a company artist under Artistic Director, Daniel Riley. Recently, he’s been commissioned as a costume designer for the company’s new cross-disciplinary work Two Blood in collaboration with Jasmin Sheppard, S. Shakthidharan and Daniel Riley, premiering in OzAsia Festival 2025. With ADT, he has performed and toured nationally with productions A Quiet Language,_ Marrow_, The Hum in collaboration with The Australian Ballet, SAVAGE and The Third.

Lopez has worked with Marrugeku, The Farm, Co3, Opera Australia, West Australian Opera, Legs on the Wall, Sydney Dance Company and with Co-artistic director of Punchdrunk (UK) Maxine Doyle through Strut Dance. He has also worked with choreographers Amrita Hepi, Tra Mi Dinh, Ghenoa Gela among others.

Choreographically, he has been commissioned to make work for Sydney Dance Company (Pre-Professional Year) premiering Like a Salmon in the Sahara (Carriageworks, 2016), Dance Makers Collective (Sydney Festival, 2021), the Keir Choreographic Awards 2020 presenting Peril at Dancehouse (VIC) and ADT’s Cultivate:One season with Down Trodden Punk(2023). He has also exhibited an installation work Roil Horizon at 4A Centre for Contemporary Asian Art (NSW), supported by Diversity Arts Australia.

Elias Nohra is an accomplished digital artist with over 20 years of experience using old, new and emerging technologies to tell stories in innovative ways. His practice has predominantly focussed on the community arts sector, developing accessible pathways to filmmaking, video game development, 360 degree VR films, digital art installations and interactive web & theatre works.

Recent artistic works include:
Community of Practice (2025) - Director/Cinematographer/Editor - a 25 minute documentarydeveloped with Arts & Cultural Exchange exploring an extensive community & cultural development training program.

Tender (2024) - Creative & Technical Director - a270 degree immersive film experience designed for the Sydney Opera House in collaboration withCuriousWorks and four emerging Western Sydney artists.

宿 (stay) (2022) - AV Designer and Operator -multidisciplinary theatre work including a 14 digital screen installation, presented at Sydney Festival.

Make Yourself At Home (2020) - Project Facilitator and Technical Producer - interactive online experience developed entirely remotely with 10 emerging artists during Covid lockdowns, with CuriousWorks

Zoe grew up in Perth and moved to Kaurna Yerta to join Australian Dance Theatre (ADT) as a Company Artist in 2021.

Zoe is thrilled to be currently working with Artistic Director Daniel Riley and Artistic Associate Brianna Kell. Zoe has performed in The Third, SAVAGE, THE HUM (in collaboration with The Australian Ballet), Cultivate:ONE, Marrow and A Quiet Language. In these years she has also worked with Adrianne Semmens, Ghenoa Gela and Carly Sheppard.

Zoe is constantly drawn to the ocean and finds its strength and grace grounding. Nature holds a special place in her creative inspiration and the connection she finds with others.

Prior to ADT, Zoe was a founding Company Artist for Co3 (2015), with Artistic Director Raewyn Hill, as well as having a strong independent career with numerous independent choreographers. She worked closely with the Co3’s youth ensemble program and was a teaching artist on regional educational tours. She has a strong passion to share dance with young people and communities, to ignite a curiosity in creating and learning.

In collaboration with Co3 Zoe has worked with Antony Hamilton (2016), Garry Stewart and West Australian Ballet (2019), CIRCA (2020) and West Australian Opera (2020).

In 2016, Zoe worked with Ochre Contemporary Dance Company and performed in Ohad Naharin’s Decadance with STRUT Dance. Zoe first debuted with Australian Dance Theatre in the world premiere Season of North/South(2019), choreographed by Garry Stewart and Norwegian choreographer Ina Christel Johannessen. In 2021 with Garry Stewart at ADT Zoe performed in Stewart’s works; Supernature, South, Objekt and G.

Zoe graduated from WAAPA with a Bachelor of Arts Degree (Dance) in 2013 and was the recipient of the Hawaiian Award for Most Outstanding Graduate. She then completed her Honours with LINK Dance Company in 2014

Karra Nam is a movement artist of Kaurna, Narungga, and Chinese ancestry.

Through her ever-evolving practice, she aims to communicate knowledge and lived experiences drawn from the exploration of ancestral lineage and culture. Her work is anchored in a meditative engagement with space, time, soul, and healing – generating unique movement pathways that challenge and decolonise dominant narratives of the Blak body’s experience.

Graduating from Adelaide College of the Arts (2022), Karra joined Australian Dance Theatre (ADT) in 2023, debuting in THE HUM – a collaboration with The Australian Ballet (2023).

She has since performed in Marrow (2024) under Daniel Riley’s directorship, as well as in the company’s Cultivate:ONE season in works Down Trodden Punk (2023) by Zachary Lopez and _NOW/AGAIN _(2023) by Brianna Kell.

Prior to joining ADT, Karra worked with Bangarra Dance Theatre under the direction of Stephen Page and Frances Rings, joining the company for productions of Sandsong (2022) and Terrain(2022).

Grateful for the experience to work alongside artists within multiple disciplines, Karra believes in a constant exploration within the depths of her practice – expanding and deepening connection to self, community, and a holistic approach to physicality.

Yilin is an Australian, Boorloo raised artist with roots from China and Malaysia joining Australian Dance Theatre as company artist in January 2025, debuting in their Adelaide Festival work A Quiet Language.

She is thrilled to have returned home, reconnecting to Australian land after living overseas for 3 years. Yilin returned from London, performing in Punchdrunk International’s The Burnt City as part of the originating cast and creation in early 2022. She has also performed with physical theatre company, Temper Theatre, taking their work HOME on a tour across China and the UK. Prior to her move, Yilin was a member of Co3 Contemporary Dance company debuting in their Perth Festival 2021 commissioned work, Archives of Humanity.

Yilin is a WAAPA graduate who pursued an extensive freelance career across Australia engaging with various independent choreographers and companies before moving overseas. She has worked and performed with STRUT Dance, Steamworks Arts, Marrugeku, Shaun Parker and Company, OCHRE and Buzz Dance Theatre, and has performed in theatre works with Barking Gecko Theatre Company and Renegade Productions.

Independently she has worked and performed globally with multiple artists, including Rachel Ogle – Precipice (2023, 2019), Sally Richardson (Steamworks Arts) – Gui Shu (2019) and Zachary Lopez – Peril, for his 2020 Keir commissioned work.

Alongside The Burnt City, a highlight of Yilin’s performing career has been being part of the first Australian cast to perform Batsheva’s Decadance through STRUT.

Yilin is also an incredibly passionate and experienced teacher, having shared her teaching practice for over 10 years. Her teaching has seen her connect with people across community, with youth and professionals. She enjoys sharing experiences, fostering creativity, encouraging curiosity and creating safe spaces that harbours joy and spontaneity.

Patrick O’Luanaigh is a dance artist born and raised in Melbourne/Naarm. He joined Australian Dance Theatre in 2023 as a Guest Artist for THE HUM in collaboration with the Australian Ballet, before moving to Adelaide to join full-time in July of that year.

During his time with ADT he has performed and toured nationally other works by Daniel Riley, including Marrow and A Quiet Language. He also performed in Down Trodden Punk by Zachary Lopez and Now/Again by Brianna Kell for Cultivate: ONE.

Independently Patrick has worked with Helen Herbertson on the on-going archival project DIG and performed Signal Issues by Dasha Tolotchkov for MPavillion in 2021. Pat’s choreographic highlights include Alight, commissioned by Banyule Council, Imbued for Deified (Melbourne Fringe Festival) and 3 Liminal Avenue (Mudfest), which won the Next Platform Award.

A graduate of the Victorian College of the Arts, Pat received the Paul and Donna Dainty Award for Excellence.

Pat loves extra-curricular activities, taking up martial arts, acting, screenwriting and showing off in his spare time.

Joshua is a Yuwaalaraay and Gamilaraay descendant from Lightning Ridge in North West NSW. Upon graduating with an Advanced Diploma from NAISDA Dance College, he was honoured with the prestigious Chairperson Award in recognition of his artistic excellence and leadership.
He engaged with Legs on the Wall, Sydney Dance Company (PPY), Karul Projects, Moorambilla, NIDA and ADT during his training.

In 2023, he was selected for Bangarra Dance Theatre’s Dance Clan, performing 5 Minute Call by Ryan Pearson. In 2024, he was a Legs on the Wall ‘Leg Up’ Mentee, which culminated in a performance of the site-specific work Now & Ever, which saw Joshua working alongside Artistic Directors Joshua Thomson and Frances Rings.

Josh is also a music composer in his storytelling, creating the soundscapes for Deadly Catch by Glory Tuohy-Daniell as part of the Telstra Emerging Choreographer with The Australian Ballet.