Keith Armstrong (QLD)

Keith Armstrong works across disciplines, as the instigator, creative director, media designer and systems integrator of installation and performance projects that utilise interactive, adaptive and immersive technology. These collaborative projects have most often emphasised performance/dance/sound and film practices, set within the context of site specific, interactive installation, and network- and web-based practices.

Qualified in the Visual Arts, Engineering and Information Technology, his practice focuses on investigations of technology’s implications for humankind, particularly as it relates to both our natural and cultural environments, and audience interactivity.

Keith has exhibited in museums and galleries, and participated in various festivals and workshops, nationally and internationally, including Brisbane Powerhouse Centre for the Live Arts, Site Gallery (UK), Tasmanian Art Gallery and Museum, 'Solar Circuit' International Artists' Gathering (Hobart), Artspace Visual Arts Centre (Sydney), Institute of Modern Art (Brisbane), Asia Pacific Triennial (Brisbane), Metro Arts (Brisbane), Alchemy International Masterclass (Brisbane), and the Exploding Cinema Conference and Festival (Rotterdam).

Mick Byrne (QLD)

Mick Byrne holds a Bachelor of Theatre Arts (Theatre Studies) from the University of Southern Queenlsand, Toowoomba. He also completed post-graduate Honours in Theatre Arts at USQ, with his thesis focussing on ‘Interrogating a multi-disciplinary approach to performance’.

Whilst studying, Mick worked variously as production manager, project coordinator and facilitator on a range of multi-disciplinary productions and workshops at La Salle USQ Student Theatre. Since 2000, he has worked for a variety of Toowoomba-based organizations on community arts projects, including 2WAMPS YOUTHARTS on the establishment and coordination of the first multi-discipline youth arts organization in Toowoomba; the Commonwealth Government’s Work for the Dole scheme on the administration and facilitation of six-month multi-arts programs; and, Warrina Services on a series of drama workshops for young people with learning disabilities. He has also lectured at USQ on youth and community arts funding opportunities, and was production manager of the 2001 Eidecan Music Festival in Toowoomba.

In 2000, Mick was awarded a nine-month mentorship with writer/director/dramaturg Maryanne Lynch through the Youth Arts Mentoring Program. In 2001, he presented a sound/light/performance installation at the Powerhouse Live Arts Centre in Brisbane as part of the Youth Arts Mentoring Program showcase.

Anna Davis (NSW)

Anna Davis is an emerging artist working with interactive DVD technologies, digital video, sound, performance and installation. She holds a BA (Media Arts, 1st Class Honours) from the College of Fine Arts (COFA), University of NSW, and is currently undertaking an MFA at COFA.

Anna has presented work at venues and festivals in Australia and internationally, including the NTT Inter Communication Centre (Tokyo), the Ujazdowski Centre for Contemporary Art (Warsaw), the International Festival of New Film (Croatia), Vir Media Café (The Netherlands) and Kasseler Dokumentarfilm und Videofest (Germany). She has recently produced a series of video works in collaboration with artist Atsushi Ogata, which have been screened at festivals and museums in Europe and Asia. In 2001, Anna curated Media.Tek, an interactive new media arts exhibition and series of seminars at Electrofringe (Newcastle) and wrote regular articles for Sydney Tribe’s on-line Digital Artistry section. She is currently developing ‘video beings’ - image and sound archives - that can be triggered via an interface during a live performance or by audiences in an installation context.

Leon Ewing (WA)

Leon Ewing has been performing professionally for almost 15 years in theatre, film, television and as a musician. His practice incorporates many areas of performance, including music, theatre, film, radio, television, as well as writing and producing his own work, and he holds a BA from the University of Western Australia, where he majored in English (theatre and creative writing) and Visual Art.

He has been commissioned to write and record music for the Black Swan Theatre Company, Perth Theatre Company, Barking Gecko, Swan Youth Theatre and Steps dance company, and produced sound art commissioned for the Listening Room, ABC Radio National. He has been a member of several bands, including Beaverloop who have toured extensively, playing with acts such as the Beastie Boys, Spiderbait and Reguritator, at festivals such as the Big Day Out and on ABC Television's Recovery program.
He recently set up the Semikazi collective of electronic arts in Perth to facilitate collaboration between musicians, VJs, performance artists and designers, and has worked for Black Swan Theatre Company devising multimedia hip-hop music theatre with young indigenous rappers from Whakathuni in the Pilbara. Leon recently devised a multimedia digi-rock opera event for the 2003 Perth International Arts Festival.

Ruth Fleishman (VIC)

Ruth Fleishman is a digital artist who holds a BFA (Double Degree Painting and Sculpture) from RMIT Melbourne and an Advanced Diploma in Electronic Design and Interactive Multimedia from Victoria University. For the past 10 years she has exhibited at galleries and artist spaces in Melbourne, including the Centre for Contemporary Photography, Linden Gallery, and Span Gallery (Melbourne). In the past five years she has focused on the development and creation of digital print and interactive art works.

Ruth's work has been exhibited as part of Waste – the Experimenta Interactive Media Lounge in the 2001 Melbourne International Festival. She presented her work at Fusion – the new media program of the St Kilda Film Festival, and her work was exhibited at the Siggraph Festival in San Antonio, Texas in 2002.

Ruth is currently developing the new media components for a production of The Psychic Guide, a performance piece written by director Chi Vu and directed by Sandra Long, as well as developing an interactive that accompanies this production. She lectures in multimedia at universities and tafes in Melbourne, consults in interactive and navigational design, and works with primary school age children making art.

Brian Fuata (NSW)

Brian Fuata is a Sydney-based performer. He has presented solo short-works and participated in short and full-length group performance works in programs such as Feast in the 2002 Adelaide Queer Festival; B-Grade, Eat My Shorts and Unbecomings at Performance Space; Youth Writes at Shop Front Theatre; Spoken Beat at PlayWorks Theatre; and Replicant Hotel at PACT Theatre.

In 2001, he undertook a four-week performance residency at Performance Space with Guillermo Gomez Pena and Juan Ybarra, developing and performing in the work The Museum of Fetishized Identities.
His first full-length solo work, Fafafienne, was directed by Nigel Kellaway for Urban Theatre Projects at Performance Space in 2001. He was commissioned by ABC Radio to write and perform Soul Geometrics with Gail Priest in 2002 and has performed collaboratively with Alan Schacher and video artist TV Moore.

Paul Gazzola (WA)

Paul Gazzola served a carpentry apprenticeship before studying Performing Arts (Dance) at the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts. His practice includes dance, performance, video, installation and set design, and he has presented work both in Australia and internationally at various festivals.

In 1994 he started working with the group Les Ballets C de la B in Belgium, and cites this experience as a major influence on his development as an artist. A history of collaboration both as a performer and visual artist has seen his involvement with such choreographers as Meg Stuart, Jim Hughes, João Fiadeiro and, since 1999, Xavier Le Roy on the ongoing investigation project EXTENSIONS.

Paul is a founding member of Perth based id339 dancegroup. His work created with the group have been invited to festivals in Berlin, Melbourne, Perth, Paris, Tomar (Portugal) and Johannesburg, and in 2002 he created the solo Bird Talk # 1.7 in co-production with the Theatre am Halleschen Ufer in Berlin. In 2002 he was also a guest teacher at the 5th Internationale Tanzwochen Muenster and in September presented his set/video design as part of the Project ŒZ‚ at the Aarhus Festival in Denmark.
His current works question the notion of the self and movement as commutable expenditure: replaceable, reusable. He is a qualified Feldenkrais Practitioner.

Scott Howie (NSW)

Scott Howie is a Wagga Wagga-based theatre director and performer whose primary focus is on the integration of multimedia technology and concepts into a theatrical/performance context. He is Artistic Director of Jibshot

Productions, a multi-media performance production company.
The work he produces, directs and performs, both individually and with the company members of Jibshot Productions, incorporates the production and interpretation of existing texts, installations, devised performances, electronic sound pieces, and, to a lesser extent, computer generated art works. He has initiated projects involving the collaboration of filmmakers, electronic musicians, lighting designers, singers, computer programmers, actors and non-actors. Jibshot’s recent production of Faust is Dead, which toured Wagga Wagga, Sydney and Canberra, blended live action with an original electronic score mixed live, an hour of projected video, and on-stage cameras producing live video footage.

Scott is currently undertaking an MA (Visual and Performing arts) at Charles Sturt University and holds a Bachelor of Education (specialising in English, Media and Drama) from the University of Canberra. He has taught Drama and Media at St Clare’s College in Canberra, and is currently Artist in Residence at Riverina Theatre Company, which involves providing writing and performance workshops for young people (16-23) and devising/directing a hybrid performance for young people. Scott has worked as Assistant Director on Riverina Theatre productions, and has performed work at the Unsound electronic music festival in Wagga Wagga.

Catherine Jones (NSW)

Catherine Jones is a professional actor working in multi-media performance, theatre, film and television. She holds a BA (Drama/Acting) from Queensland University of Technology. An emerging artist in writing and collaborating for multi-media performance, Catherine's interest is in interactivity.

In 2002, Catherine went to New York with assistance from the Australia Council and Australian Network for Art + Technology to participate in workshops with dance/theatre company Troika Ranch as a basis for the development of a multi-media performance at The Kitchen. In 2001, she was invited to undertake a residency at Performance Space, Sydney with assistance from the Australia Council for the creative development of an interactive, multi-media performance.

Catherine’s live theatre credits include The Party Line's Steel Fracture, After Dinner (Edinburgh Fringe) and solo performances for One Extra Dance's Queer Bits, That Elusive Thrill 2000 and Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras. Film and television credits include Fat Cow Motel, The Mormon Conquest, The Last Paperboy, Tunnel Vision, Murder Call and All Saints.

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