Workshop: Theatremaking with Back to Back Theatre

Ingrid is a performance maker and director who has collaborated on more than 30 new works of performance across theatre, dance and emerging forms. Ingrid’s practice encompasses devising, dramaturgy, choreography and writing; and she values long-term creative conversations and partnerships. With a background in dance, Ingrid’s work always begins with the body.

Ingrid is an Artistic Director at Back to Back Theatre, where she makes new work, curates community programs and projects, and facilitates art-making processes, most recently working with Back to Back ensemble member Sarah Mainwaring on Sarah’s solo experiment, Elephant. Ingrid is a former artistic director of Adelaide’s Restless Dance Theatre (directing 10 works), was a frequent collaborating artist with Kate Sulan and Rawcus over more than a decade, and has a long collaborative history with performance makers Astrid Pill, Zoë Barry and Gaelle Mellis.

Ingrid is currently in development on Widow Weirdo with Astrid Pill; and The Nervous Atmosphere with Zoë Barry.

Based on Waddawurrung Country in the Victorian regional centre of Geelong, Back to Back Theatre is widely recognised as an Australian theatre company of national and international significance. The company is driven by an ensemble of actors who identify as having an intellectual disability or as neurodivergent. The company is considered one of Australia’s most important cultural exporters.

From 2009 to 2024, the company has undertaken 88 national and 130 international seasons of its work. This includes presentations and screenings at the world’s pre-eminent contemporary arts festivals and venues such as the Edinburgh International Festival, London’s V&A Museum and the Barbican, Vienna Festival, Holland Festival and Theater der Welt, the Kennedy Center in Washington DC, the Public Theater in New York, Festival Tokyo, West Kowloon Cultural District Authority in Hong Kong, and Buenos Aires International Festival.

Since 2009, we have delivered community and education workshops to over 34,000 participants, with a focus on artistic excellence and inclusive practice.

Back to Back Theatre has received 23 national and international awards, including the 2024 Venice Biennale Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement in Theatre, an International Ibsen Award, a Helpmann Award for Best Australian Work, an Edinburgh International Festival Herald Angel Critics’ Award, two Age Critics’ Awards, a New York Bessie and the Sidney Myer Performing Arts Group Award for our long-standing contribution to the development of Australian theatre. In 2015, Bruce Gladwin received the Australia Council for the Arts’ Inaugural Award for Outstanding Achievement in Theatre. The ensemble was awarded the ‘Best Ensemble’ in the 2019 Green Room Awards.