2023 Creative Team
Emily McLean – Artistic Director (2019 – present)
Emily McLean trained at WAAPA and is a founding member of Red Ryder Theatre Company. She has directed for Black Swan State Theatre Company, Perth Theatre Company, Deckchair, Red Ryder, WAAPA, Curtin University, Maiden Voyage Theatre Company, Downstairs at the Maj and others. In 2014, she directed the world premiere of Dust by Suzie Miller for Black Swan, which won the WA Premier’s Award for best script. Red Ryder’s production of Grounded by George Brant, directed by Emily, was a sell out and won both the Members’ Choice and Best Production at the 2016 Blue Room Awards and the PAWA Award for Best Independent Production for 2016. In 2017, she directed Second Year Musical Theatre Students at WAAPA and Toast by Liz Newell, a new West Australian work at The Blue Room. Toast won the Best Production at the 2017 Blue Room Awards. In 2018, she directed A Streetcar Named Desire with the third year acting students at WAAPA, and Blackrock with Curtin Theatre Arts students. In the last eight years she has directed ten new Australian works. Emily won the Equity Award for directing in 2006 for Dealer’s Choice and in 2007 for The Mozart Faction.
Amy Wiseman – Event Manager (2016-2021, and 2023)
Amy Wiseman is a dance artist working as a mover/maker, teacher, writer and producer. A WAAPA graduate, Amy completed her BA in Dance with LINK Dance Company in 2008. She performed and toured with Australian electro-pop band Empire of the Sun from 2009-2013, and makes up one-third of Perth-based collective Unkempt Dance. Unkempt aim to engage and amuse a diverse audience with their idiosyncratic style of dance theatre, mixed with a little bit of charm. As part of Unkempt, Amy has created and produced work for Adelaide Fringe, Perth Fringe World, Canberra Short + Sweet and various STRUT Dance seasons, and have been commissioned to create work for Co3 Contemporary Dance Australia, the City of Perth, the National Architecture Conference, LINK Dance Company and the Australian Dance Awards. They were also the pioneering production team of In-Situ (now Situ-8) which has grown to become an annual performance event for movement and composition in Perth.
As a producer, Amy worked as Projects Manager for Ausdance WA from 2014 – 2018, and currently works for STRUT Dance, as well as teaching dance in schools throughout the Perth metro area.
April Vardy – Choreographer / Rehearsal Director (2021 to present)
April Vardy moved to Perth in 2013 to complete a Bachelor of Dance at WAAPA and an Honours degree as part of LINK Dance Company also at WAAPA, graduating in November 2016.
Since then she has choreographed and performed as part of Fringe Festival for the past four years. Including being a co-creator of the site-speciLic work ‘In Cahoots’ which was awarded WA overall winner of the Dance & Physical Theatre category. She also performed in Perth Festival in 2021, in ‘Structural Dependency’ at the State Theatre Centre of WA. Since graduating April has been teaching at a number of dance and high schools all over Perth including, John Curtin College of the Arts, La Salle College, WA Stage School, Swan River Ballet, Willetton Senior High School, Rossmoyne Senior High School, MLC Claremont, All Saints’ College, and HotHouse Company. She has also been a Teaching Artist for West Australian Ballet for the past two years, this has involved regional teaching in Kalgoorie, Narrogin and Wagin, as well as teaching the public classes.
Past Creative Team
Cameron Lansdown-Goodman – Event Manager (2022)
Cameron Lansdown-Goodman is a graduate of Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts with a Bachelor of Arts (Dance) in 2014 and a Bachelor of Arts (Arts Management) in 2018. Throughout his career Cameron has worked in a variety of roles including a performer, teacher, maker and producer of dance and performance. Cameron works exclusively in Perth for Perth Based artists, where he has gone on to tour shows made in Western Australia to Queensland, Victoria, New South Wales and the United States of America.
Cameron was awarded the 2016 WA award for Dance and Physical Theatre for his self-produced and choreographed production titled Brainchild. The production went on to tour to Sydney Fringe Festival and Melbourne Fringe Festival.
Cameron has done extensive work with organisations around Perth including Ochre Contemporary Dance Company, Ausdance WA and Performing Arts Connections Australia. He has worked on many events including International Dance Day and the 2018 Making Space Conference and Performing Arts Exchange.
Adam Mitchell – Artistic Director
Kynan Hughes – 2018 and 2020 Set Solo Choreographer and Dance Rehearsal Director
Kynan graduated from the West Australian Academy of Performing Arts with an Advanced Diploma of Performing Arts in Dance in 2000. Since then he has worked with a range of companies around Australia including: Leigh Warren and Dancers, Dance North & Sydney Dance Company under Rafael Bonachela, performing & touring a range of new & established works, both in Australia and overseas. Kynan has also choreographed a number of works & taught at various companies and institutions around Australia.
Since returning to Perth in 2012, Kynan has attained his Bachelor of Arts, performed as Feather in Sally Richardson’s The Ghost’s Child, in James Berlyn’s Tenebrae et Lux for PIAF & Sue Peacock’s Reflect for which he was nominated as ‘Best Male Performer’ in the 2013 West Australian Dance Awards. He choreographed & performed in With a Bullet: The Album Project for the Fringe Festival and choreographed works for LINK Dance Company, STEPS Youth Dance Company & for WAAPA. He was part of BIG Stretch: a program taking contemporary dance to remote indigenous communities in the Kimberley. Hughes performed in two new works for the 2014 Fringe festival: RITES – dying to dance by Sally Richardson & THE MAN – a collaboration with Chrissie Parrott. THE MAN won the 2014 Fringe award for Performance & was nominated in the categories’ of best Choreography and Performance by a male dancer at the 2014 WA dance awards. He performed with Buzz Dance Theatre in Lucas Jervies Plain Jane, which toured to schools & was part of the AWESOME Festival for children.
Kynan also returned to Adelaide to work with Leigh Warren and Dancers & the State Opera South Australia for the world premiere of the Phillip Glass Trilogy in Einstein on the Beach. In 2015/16 Kynan choreographed two works for ShortCUTS at STRUT Dance – Rorschach and love you still, and performed in Joe Lui’s Selkie. Kynan recently completed three major commissions; creating the exam materials for 2017/19 for the Education Department of WA, a work for Beijing Normal University, and the opening night of the City of Perth’s Winter Arts Festival. He is currently co-curating IN Situ: a program of site specific work for local independent artists and he is a sessional lecturer at WAAPA. His new work Valentine premiered in November, 2017 as part of the Blue Room Theatre’s Aug – Dec Development season and his latest work Love/Less will premiere in the MOVEME Festival in September 2018.
Performing Arts Perspectives WA 