About Us

Explore

Regions

Performing Lines at APAM 2026

Performing Lines produces the work of independent artists across Australia, from concept to premiere and beyond. We champion this sector as a powerful force of contemporary cultural expression, demonstrating the value of artist-led practice.

Our portfolio of artists, projects and sector development programs reflect a rich diversity of artistic voices and forms that span contemporary dance, multi-artform, First Nations performance, work for children and families and much more, creating a broad range of opportunities to connect with your many different audiences and artist communities.

We would love to meet presenters and collaborators looking to be a part of new projects in development or touring throughout 2026-2027.

Please check out a selection from our portfolio below and see who’s attending APAM from our team to line up a chat.

Click the links below to browse the available projects:

Meet the APAM Team

Head to the bottom of the page to meet the team attending APAM this year, and come and say hi in person.

Pitching at APAM 2026

SAMPAI, TAK SAMPAI

Jumaadi and Michael Toisuta

Sampai, Tak Sampai (to arrive, not to arrive) is a large-scale multidisciplinary live performance collaboration by visual artist Jumaadi and sound artist Michael Toisuta.

Grounded in Indonesia’s histories of forced migration and environmental change, the world of Sampai, Tak Sampai grows from Jumaadi’s paintings and unfurls through projection, sound and light examining the complexity of mass displacement driven by political demands and natural catastrophes.

The artists are currently developing the work between Indonesia and Australia, readying it for presentation from late 2026. They will draw from Indonesian storytelling traditions and experiment with exhibition and performance formats to create an immersive and durational event.

Genre: Multi-art form
Venue: Alternative
Status: In development, premiering late 2026
Touring Party: TBC
Themes & connections: Indonesia, shadow play, visual art, migration, diversity, immersive, durational performance

Producer: Jane Schon
jane@performinglines.org.au

THE VISITORS

Moogahlin Performing Arts and Sydney Theatre Company

On a sweltering day in January 1788, seven clan leaders gather on a sandstone escarpment overlooking the harbour. The attendees, six of them Elders and one new initiate, catch-up, laugh together, share a meal and compare notes. But beyond the friendly banter, protocols, and hospitality, a momentous decision is waiting to be made.

A mysterious fleet of giant nawi is amassing in the harbour and as they creep closer, these seven representatives must choose unanimously: whether to send these strangers on their way or welcome them?

Co-produced by Moogahlin Performing Arts and Sydney Theatre Company, The Visitors is a hugely entertaining study of how communities respond to change and the unknown.

Genre: Theatre
Venue: Small-Medium, Large
Status: Available to tour
Touring Party: 13
Themes & connections: First Nations Theatre, First Nations perspective, colonisation, resilience, mainstage

Producer: Kath Papas
kath@performinglines.org.au

In Development

THE FIRE PROJECT

Andrea Gibbs

The Fire Project is an immersive audio visual installation in development by Andrea Gibbs, transforming real-life bushfire stories into a shared listening experience. Drawing on interviews with fire affected communities across regional Western Australia and South Australia, alongside First Nations cultural burning knowledge and evocative sound design, the work situates local experiences within a national environmental and cultural context.

With a design focus on flexible presentation models, audiences will be immersed in raw, human stories of resilience, humour and heartbreak. The experience invites deep listening, reflection and engaged dialogue, fostering empathy whilst offering pathways towards regeneration, understanding and hope in a changing climate.

Genre: Multi-art form
Venue: Alternative/Outdoor, Small-Medium
Status: In development
Touring Party: TBC
Themes & connections: True Stories, bushfire, regional and First Nations perspective, immersive, audio-visual installation, Climate Change, shared listening & conversation, resilience, regeneration, hope.

Producer: Jen Leys
jen@performinglineswa.org.au

SPHINX

THE RABBLE

SPHINX is a cinematic performance work investigating the economics and experience of care givers, developed through research partnerships within the health sector. Part experimental film, part community engaged work, part song cycle and part contemporary performance event, SPHINX is set to be THE RABBLE’s most ambitious work to date.

The work is set on a revolve that slowly turns, a camera in the centre capturing the details of each act of care as it rotates past. Each rotation is a new scene – a woman caring for her dying mother, a cleaner leaving her children to clean someone else’s house, a nurse showering an elderly patient. Epic worlds are revealed as each act of care becomes an operatic and heroic gesture.

Genre: Theatre
Venue: Large
Status: In development
Touring Party: TBC
Themes & connections: Care, economics of care, community, scale, cinematic experimentation, 360 panning techniques, feminism.

Producer: Samantha Butterworth
samantha@performinglines.org.au

THE ACT

Amrita Hepi with Mish Grigor and Tilly Lawless

A collaboration between two professionals that tests the transactional limits of art and erotic power.
The body is a vehicle for desire and for expression.

Amrita Hepi, a Bunjalung Ngapuhi artist is one of Naarm/Melbourne’s pre-eminent voices in contemporary dance. Tilly Lawless is a writer and sex worker who shares sharp and heartfelt insights into queer romance and the stigma faced by sex workers. Joined by Mish Grigor, over several years they’ve built an absorbing and original performance language that explores the hidden parallels between their worlds. Through movement and intimate dialogue, they interrogate the delicate balance between personal expression and professional service, between artistic integrity and market demands.

Genre: Contemporary Performance
Venue: Small-Medium, Large
Status: In development, Available to tour
Touring Party: 5-6
Themes & connections: Dance, Labour, Sex Work, First Nations, Queer.

Producer: Thom Smyth
thom@performinglines.org.au

TRIANGULAR RHYTHMS

Nick Power

Triangular Rhythms is a Hip Hop project uniting Breakers from Vanuatu, New Caledonia and Australia for collaborative creative development and exchange, led by choreographer Nick Power and grounded in a partnership with Wan Smolbag Theatre (Port Vila).

Triangular Rhythms creates pathways for continued amplification of street dance’s place in contemporary performance making, and for career development for Pacific artists. After further development in Vanuatu in 2026, it will be extended into a full-length work with visual and lighting design over 2027, ready for presentation in 2028. Key collaborators include DJ Total Eclipse, and Demilition B-girl (Demi Sorono).

Genre: Contemporary Dance
Venue: Outdoor/Alternative, Small-Medium
Status: In development
Touring Party: TBC
Themes & connections: Hip Hop, Breaking, House, Krumping, DJing, Pasifika, intercultural

Producer: Kath Papas
kath@performinglines.org.au

WATCH HER BURN

Nicola Ingram

A new play by Palawa / Wiradjuri emerging playwright Nicola Ingram.

The script is inspired by the dialogue and protests surrounding the Brighton Bypass, a site where an archaeological survey was found to contain the oldest evidence of human habitation in the southern hemisphere in the path of a planned major highway. This is the catalyst for four Aboriginal characters to navigate questions of identity, responsibility and bureaucracy. Giving voice to those conversations that are often held behind closed doors, between Aboriginal families and Community, and by individuals that work for a government making decisions on behalf of a Community who aren’t at the table. Who has a right to make decisions on behalf of a culture?

Watch Her Burn will premiere in 2026/27.

Genre: Theatre
Venue: Small-Medium
Status: In development
Touring Party: 7-8
Themes & connections: First Nations, Cultural identity and heritage, family legacy, government, politics.

Producer: Sinsa Mansell
sinsa@performinglinestas.org.au

THE LINE

Nathan Maynard
Co-produced with ILBIJERRI Theatre Company

The Black Line as it was known involved 2,200 soldiers, settlers and convicts, who were assembled as part of a military campaign by the British. Together they became a human chain which crossed the districts of Lutruwita/Tasmania, intimidating, capturing, and displacing Aboriginal People. The Frontier Wars remains the largest domestic military offensive in Australian history. A genocide often misrepresented for its legacy of destruction. Through highlighting the ongoing effects of the Frontier Wars on the Palawa people, The Line prospects a way forward. A passionate story that speaks to the truth of this country and celebrates First Peoples.

This provocative, funny and formally ambitious new work will premiere in 2027.

Genre: Theatre
Venue: Large
Status: In development
Touring Party: 14
Themes & connections: First Nations Theatre, colonisation, the Black War, technology, puppetry

Producer: Sinsa Mansell
sinsa@performinglinestas.org.au

KAMASUTRA

Raghav Handa

Kamasutra is a dance theatre work by choreographer and performer Raghav Handa that interrogates desire, pleasure and power through the lens of the ancient Sanskrit scripture. Blending movement, voice and sound the work explores the text’s radical philosophy beyond its sexual reputation.

Through humour and absurdity drawn from the scripture’s surprising verses, audiences encounter intimate explorations of ambition, submission, and transcendence. This innovative cross-cultural work challenges modern taboos around sex, morality, and power, inviting viewers to suspend inhibitions and confront urgent questions about the human condition. Experience a provocative reimagining of the body as a site of desire rather than control.

Genre: Contemporary Dance
Venue: Large
Status: In development
Touring Party: TBC
Themes & connections: Sex, power, religion, the body, the absurd, sensuality.

Producer: Vanessa Wright
vanessa@performinglines.org.au

MY FIRST AND LAST SOLO SHOW

Natalie Rose

My First and Last Solo Show is a funny but serious exploration of mother-daughter relationships. Created and performed by Nat Rose, a Western Sydney artist and mother, this autobiographical performance unpacks how trauma can directly (or indirectly) affect how you parent. As one-third of POST, formed in 2003 with extensive international touring experience, Nat creates work that blends live art, theatre and contemporary performance, combining deep irreverence for the institution of live theatre and a deep reverence for the ephemeral beauty it houses.

This new work features voice recordings and family videos from Nat’s life, interrogating themes of memory, love and loss, created in collaboration with peer mentors who are also parents. And importantly Nat’s daughter Mabelle is a co-creator – with recent credits of her own, including POV by re:group performance collective and THE CENSOR as part of Sydney Festival. The work will premiere in Western Sydney in September 2026.

Genre: Theatre
Venue: Small-Medium
Status: In development, Available to tour
Touring Party: TBC
Themes & connections: Motherhood, intergenerational trauma, Alzheimers disease, domestic violence, verbatim/documentary theatre, comedy.

Producer: Jane Schon
jane@performinglines.org.au

Available to Tour

RINSE

Amrita Hepi with Mish Grigor

The first Australian work to perform at Festival d’Avignon, Rinse explores the intoxication of ‘beginnings’, the White Western obsession with the new; the first lines, the first steps, the first contact. An award-winning dance theatre work exploring personal, dance and global histories through refreshing and disarmingly funny and astute text and movement.

Genre: Theatre, Contemporary Dance
Venue: Small – Medium, Large
Status: Available to tour
Touring Party: 4
Themes & connections: Dance theatre, First Nations, dance history, colonisation, pop culture, ‘beginnings’.

Producer: Thom Smyth
thom@performinglines.org.au

THE BLOK!

A Daylight Connection

THE BLOK! is a wild, satirical battle for creative control. An artist known as The Master, drowning in spiralling ego and crushing writers block (Carly Sheppard), hits rock bottom, and is visited by a divine Blak Creator (Alexis West). The Creator unravels the myths of artistic genius, white patriarchal supremacy, and the singular notion of God.

THE BLOK! is a spiritually rogue theatre experience that exploits classic genres, pop culture, modern-day tropes, and mythical iconography, to create a sublime feast of divine revelation and ego-fuelled chaos. It is performance as rebellion; creation as disruption – radical, Blak, and funny as hell.

Genre: Theatre
Venue: Small-Medium
Status: Available to tour
Touring Party: 5
Themes & connections: First Nations theatre, satire, comedy, the myths of artistic genius, white patriarchal supremacy, and the singular notion of God.

Producer: Carmen Lai
carmen@performinglines.org.au

AN UNCERTAIN TIME

Sarah Austin

An Uncertain Time is a sensory and immersive performance work for babies aged 0 to 12 months and their carers, created by artistic collective Sarah Austin and Co.

The work engages with child-led approaches to participation and engagement. Thematically the work explores the notion of uncertainty that permeates the first year of a child’s life, both for the child and for their carers. It ponders the infinite possibility and potentiality of early childhood, as well as the responsibility of caring for new life in an ever changing and often unstable global environment.

The work uses a combination of live and recorded music, ethereal lighting design, visual projections, physical theatre and circus, and sensory experiences.

Genre: Theatre
Venue: Small-Medium
Status: Touring
Touring Party: 4
Themes & connections: Babies, Parenthood, High Production values work for babies, Immersive.

Producer: Samantha Butterworth
samantha@performinglines.org.au

DEEJAY x DANCER

Nick Power

Deejay x Dancer brings Hip Hop’s traditional dance and musical instrument back into sharp focus, honouring the initial connection that sparked the worldwide culture, utilising this foundation to create new histories.

Featuring three of Australia’s most accomplished Breakers fuelled by world champion turntablist DJ Total Eclipse on the wheels of steel, this work continues Nick Power’s choreographic exploration of Hip Hop’s rituals and origins. Deejay x Dancer is a thrilling call and response showdown, highlighting the skill, playfulness and connection between these two Hip Hop forms.

Genre: Contemporary Dance
Venue: Outdoor/Alternative, Small-Medium
Status: Available to tour
Touring Party: 6
Themes & connections: Hip Hop, Breaking, DJing, street dance communities, whole of family event, exciting, responsive, playful.

Producer: Kath Papas
kath@performinglines.org.au

UNWOMAN (the protest)

THE RABBLE

UNWOMAN (the protest) is a durational live event by THE RABBLE created with community, that collates hundreds of testimony around birth, fertility, pregnancy and bodily autonomy.

The work is a celebratory, harrowing, and powerful live artwork, that is horrified by the history, systems and laws that attempt to curb bodily autonomy and reproductive rights. As the light changes behind them, each participant steps forward and reads their testimony to the audience. The testimony includes their name, age, number of pregnancies and then a short statement about their experience.

Community members across all genders and of all experiences are encouraged to participate.

Genre: Contemporary Performance
Venue: Outdoor/Alternative
Status: Touring
Touring Party: 5
Themes & connections: Birth, Fertility, Parenting, Community Engagement.

Producer: Samantha Butterworth
samantha@performinglines.org.au

LEGENDS (of the Golden Arches)

Merlynn Tong and Joe Paradise Lui

Merlynn and Joe hold a vigil for their dead grandfathers. Merlynn wants to preserve the rites of her forebears. Joe thinks it’s a load of superstition. As the night wears on, things get a little overheated, and the Lords of the 18 levels of hell decide to step in.

LEGENDS (of the Golden Arches) is a heart-filled buddy comedy and deeply personal examination of the Asian cultural experience and the enduring power of friendship.

Genre: Theatre
Venue: Large, Small-Medium
Status: Available to tour
Touring Party: 5
Themes & connections: CALD communities, cultural identity and heritage, friendship, family and legacy, self-reflection

Producer: Kath Papas
kath@performinglines.org.au

CHARCOAL

Keia McGrady

Charcoal is a contemporary dance meditation, exploration of memory and our evolving relationship with Country. Through the body and onto canvas, it traces a dialogue between spirit and land. A mapping of place both seen and felt.

Inspired by the physical and invisible textures of landscape, Charcoal invites audiences to witness Country as a living, breathing presence. It is a space for deep listening to land, to lineage, to the subtle shifts in terrain over time. A reflection on place, identity, and the marks we leave behind.

The work can be presented as a studio dance performance or adapted to galleries and other spaces as part of public programs.

This is not just performance. This is offering. This is remembering.

Genre: Contemporary Dance
Venue: Outdoor/Alternative, Small-Medium
Status: Available to tour
Touring Party: 4
Themes & connections: First Nations knowledge, climate change, community engagement

Producer: Sinsa Mansell
sinsa@performinglinestas.org.au

ARCO (Jnr/Snr)

Adam Kelly and James Berlyn

ARCO is Adam Kelly’s award-winning show about living with autism, or, in Finbar the fish’s case, living in water. The show takes a heartfelt look at the life and struggles of a young man trying to make connections with the people and world around him. Along the way Adam asks gently of his audience to consider life from his perspective.

There are two versions of the show. ARCO Jnr is for children (7+) and families, reflecting on autism, rejection, community and optimism. ARCO Snr, for more mature audiences (15+), also explores celibacy.

Genre: Theatre
Venue: Small-Medium
Status: Touring
Touring Party: 4-5
Themes & connections: Autism, disability, community, inclusion, hope, interactive, children’s theatre, family friendly

Producer: Melanie Julien-Martial
mel@performinglineswa.org.au

Artist Profiles

SENSORIUM THEATRE

Sensorium Theatre is a Perth-based company leading Australia in the creation of original live performance for young audiences with disability. Founded in 2010 by Francis Italiano and Michelle Hovane, Sensorium is best known for its joyful, immersive, multi-sensory theatre works including Jub Jub Tree, Oddysea, Whoosh! and Wonderbox. These works are created specifically for children with multiple and complex disabilities and those on the autism spectrum.

Sensorium’s practice centres access, care and artistic rigour, creating intentionally small-scale performances within specially designed sensory environments. Audiences are invited onstage alongside the artists, with performances continually adapted in response to individual communication styles, learning needs and sensory preferences. Each child becomes an active participant in the unfolding story.

Following a major 13-venue national tour of Wonderbox (2024–2025) and a successful season at West Kowloon Funfest (2025), Sensorium continues to refine impactful touring models and pursue targeted national and international partnerships, exchange and collaboration.

Producer: Joo Tan
joo@performinglineswa.org.au

BETTY GRUMBLE

Betty Grumble (aka Emma Maye Gibson) is a Warrane/Sydney based performance artist engaging her body as a hopeful and medicinal site for catharsis and pleasure. Smashing together ritual theatre, cabaret, performance art and multi-media, she creates art as a site of spiritual action and personal transformation.

Recent highlights include Grumblism at Belvoir Theatre, a successful Edinburgh Fringe season of Enemies of Grooviness, and upcoming Biennale of Sydney commission Workers Wives (premiering March 2026). Winner of the Performance Space Fellowship, she’s developing new work Beast under the guidance of mentor Annie Sprinkle.

Grumble is currently interested in residency opportunities to expand both her practice and international networks, and provide space for deep research into her upcoming projects.

Helpmann Nominated, Sydney Theatre Award Nominated, Green Room Award Winner, Gibson has presented work at Sydney Opera House, Glastonbury, Dark Mofo, MoMA (NYC), and beyond.

Producer: Thom Smyth
thom@performinglines.org.au

Sector Development Initiatives

Performing Lines has a deep commitment to sector development, having developed a range of short- and long-term initiatives that aim to develop the professional skills of both emerging and established producers and artists.

Our suite of programs and initiatives continue to evolve to meet the ever-changing demands of the sector, with models that are often adapted to new contexts and locations.

We welcome discussions about new partnerships, both national and international, that continue to support the sustainability of the sector.

NATIONAL PRODUCERS PLATFORM

The National Producers Platform is a skills development program for emerging producers. Participants undertake a ten-week series of online workshops, facilitated by experienced producers and industry practitioners from across Australia.

The ten-week program covers a wide range of topics from budgets, grants and contracts to best practices in equity, inclusion and Indigenous Cultural and Intellectual Property (ICIP), building a holistic picture of the producing process. Participants are paired with an industry mentor to provide guidance outside of the platform. The cohort also attend the Australian Performing Arts Exchange (APAX) to provide opportunities for networking and further professional development.

Following the workshops, select participants undertake a paid five-week full-time industry placement with a partner organisation to consolidate their skills, further extend their networks, gain vital on-the-job experience and promote pathways into employment.

Producer: Jane Schon
jane@performinglines.org.au

REGIONAL ARTIST RESIDENCY

The Performing Lines Tasmania Regional Artist Residency brings artists from across Lutruwita/Tasmania together in a dynamic, collaborative space to explore new ideas and enhance their creative practices.

Expert mentors from across the country, bring a wealth of knowledge, perspectives and guidance that supports participants’ project development, deepens artistic exploration and expands their networks.

Many projects that begin here have attracted new collaborators, developed into full works and, in some cases, had major festival seasons and received critical acclaim.

Producer: Sinsa Mansell
sinsa@performinglinestas.org.au

MAKE SOME SPACE

Make Some Space is a practice-based training program for ten creative producers and artists aged 15-25. It is designed as a workshop program for regional and metropolitan settings to build pathways into the arts for young people.

The 10 participants are paid a fee to participate in a 3 week intensive workshop program culminating in a public creative outcome which they create and produce.

Participants are selected via an open call, prioritising a breadth of art forms, cultural experiences, gender identification and ages to build the next generation of diverse arts leaders.

MAKE SOME SPACE premiered in 2025 and was hosted by Footscray Community Arts.

Producer: Samantha Butterworth
samantha@performinglines.org.au

The Team

Samantha Butterworth
Senior Producer VIC

samantha@performinglines.org.au

Jen Leys
Senior Producer WA

jen@performinglineswa.org.au

Sinsa Mansell
Senior Producer TAS

sinsa@performinglinestas.org.au

Kath Papas
Senior Producer National

kath@performinglines.org.au

Jane Schon
Producer NSW

jane@performinglines.org.au

Vanessa Wright
Senior Producer NSW

vanessa@performinglines.org.au

Simon Wellington
Executive Producer

simon@performinglines.org.au

View National

Visit

View New South Wales

Visit

Visit

View Tasmania

Visit

Visit

View Victoria

Visit

View Western Australia

Visit

Visit

In everything we do, we acknowledge that we live on Aboriginal land and constantly learn from the wisdom of First Peoples.

Where we are and the history that precedes us informs how we work and how we move forward. 

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people should be aware that this website may contain images, voices and names of deceased persons.