Nerida Matthaei —

Artistic Director of Phluxus2 Dance Collective

Dr Nerida Matthaei is an award winning choreographer, performer, researcher and producer, and the Artistic Director of Phluxus2 Dance Collective. Nerida is a much sought-after collaborator across the dance and dance theatre industry sectors and has been creating work for eighteen years.

Nerida regularly works with companies and artists such as Polytoxic Dance Theatre, The Good Room, The Danger Ensemble, The Crackup Sisters, Queensland Theatre, Red Leap Theatre and Nick Cave/GOMA. In 2016, Nerida attended the World Dance Alliance ChoreoLab in Korea and received the inaugural Lin Chin Award for Best Emerging Researcher.

Her works for Phluxus2 Dance Collective include: the machine that carries the soul (awarded), The Opposite of Prompt, chinese whispers/broken telephone, Boiling Point, de-generator, The Paratrooper Project, angel-monster and she facilitates the annual THE indepenDANCE PROJECT - an independent dance development and new work seeding initiative.

Her work has been nominated and awarded numerous accolades including Critics Choice for Best Choreography 2007 Short and Sweet Dance Festival, Runner Up for Best Performance In Dance and Movement 2006 The Age Melbourne Fringe Festival, nominations in The Helpmann Awards, The Matilda Awards and over 13 long list nominations in the Australian Dance Awards.

Nerida was recently invited to join the 2018 Jack Morton Worldwide Ceremonies Choreographic Team for the Gold Coast Commonwealth Games Opening Ceremony and received three nominations in the 2018 Australian Dance Awards long list. She has recently performed in the award-winning Dali After Dark presented by Briefs Factory at Perth Fringe Festival.

Over the past five years, Nerida has completed a Doctor of Creative Industries (QUT) that has sought to recontextualise and re-route the choreographic self through practice-led experimentation developing newfound principles of practice into a series of new works. angel-monster is the first work Nerida will present since completing her doctorate and as such it is with great excitement that Phluxus2 Dance Collective are touring interstate in 2019.