Announcing the Artists' International Development Fund winners

Opening ceremony of Castlemaine State Festival, Australia. Co-produced and delivered by Tristan Glover, AIDF participant. Photograph: Shane Carey

We're excited to announce the 19 theatre and dance artists who have received awards from the Artists' International Development Fund (AIDF) in the 17th round of applications. 

AIDF is an initiative from the British Council and Arts Council England to help artists collaborate with other countries and forge international contacts. The fund allows creative practitioners to travel overseas to develop their skills and connect with local organisations, artists and audiences. The programme is open to creative producers, curators, editors and artists as well as architects, fashion designers and designers based in England.

At the British Council, one of our aims is to help UK creatives build international careers. This can be difficult for those without funding or international connections so initiatives such as AIDF and our bursaries to attend IETM can help to start the process. The next round, Round 18, will be the last round of AIDF.

"My ideas and views on sustainability as an artist have changed"

Artists who have previously been supported by AIDF return home with a different perspective. "I feel I have now been challenged to not make work that sits within my comfort zone but to be bold and experiment more", says Rachel Nanyonjo who collaborated with Tabuflo, Ndere Dance Troupe and Mackerere University in Uganda in 2015. "My ideas and views on sustainability as an artist have changed."

Successful theatre and dance applicants for AIDF Round 17:

Adebo Adebayo will spend a week with playwright Miran Hadzic in Kosovo hosted by Intent Theatre. He will stage an Albanian language reading of a radio play and research the viability of founding an audio drama festival in Kosovo.

Amy Letman will attend Fusebox, an international festival in Austin, Texas to engage with global artists and expand her networks. She will learn from Fusebox’s socially engaged model and approach to philanthropy. She will also host Fusexbox's Artistic Director, Ron Berry in the UK.

Amy Mason will build links with Malaysian theatres and artists for her current work-in-progress show Hot or Not and future projects via partnerships with KLPac, PenangPac and Five Arts

Andy Field will complete a two-week residency in São Paulo, Brazil, hosted by curator Natalia Mallo. He’ll explore the creation of socially engaged performance in and for the city and the region more broadly including the first ever South American performance of Lookout, a piece created by Field and children aged 8—11.

Avatara Ayuso will visit Ottawa and the Canadian Arctic to research the indigenous Inuit performing arts traditions. She will visit the National Inuit and Women’s Associations in Ottawa, the Performing Arts Centre of the Canadian Arctic, and Nunavut Arts and Crafts Association to interview Inuit women and families. The research will inform a choreographic duet.

Catherine Foley will meet with Dance Safe Korea, exploring how Lindy hop and vernacular jazz training and performance differs in the UK and Korea and explore how they’re improving gender equality and neutrality in this traditionally male / female partnered dance form.

Chamundeeswari Kuppuswamy will work with philologist Dr. Phillips-Rodriguex at UNAM, Mexico City developing new dance choreography informed by classical Sanskrit literature.

Chisato Minamimura will undertake a research and development in Japan to inform a new digital artwork and solo performance Scored in Silence about the lived experiences of deaf Hibakusha – the term given to the survivors of the A-bombs that fell on Nagasaki and Hiroshima in 1945.

Chris Fonseca will complete a cultural exchange with dance and theatre company Redeafination in Singapore to get a better understanding of international sign language, international deaf dance culture and a wider understanding of the Singapore Deaf community.

Dan Daw will spend studio time with Los Angeles performance company, Theatre Movement Bazaar to explore his performance practice outside of UK disability arts contexts within a cast of older and highly experienced physical performers.

Evan Ifekoya will travel to Los Angeles to research the script development of a project that will be presented at Block Universe in 2018 and ICA LA in 2019. The script explores ways that desire and bodies are depicted in popular culture, and how science fiction might re-orientate LGBT and BAME experience.

Francesca Tennant will travel to California to work with The Actors Gang — who work inside prisons, the Red Ladder Theatre Company — a social justice theatre company who work with offenders, and Spoon Jackson — an inmate who runs his own theatre company inside a prison in California. Tennant will implement her findings into her own practice in the UK.

James Cousins will travel to Cambodia to work with Epic Encounters, an integrated dance company based in Kampot, to create a new work for the company that will be performed in Cambodia, with the potential for future international touring both in the region and in the UK.

Javaad Alipoor will complete a residency in Sydney, Australia working alongside BAME artists in the city. He will also meet with Joanne Kee, Executive Producer for the National Theatre of Parramatta to build a long term relationship and potential Australian tour of his Fringe First award winning play The Believers Are But Brothers.

Lea Anderson will visit Peru to research her interest in reimagining indigenous or folk dance and its role in ideas of identity, nation and tradition. She will build a network of contacts to create opportunities to make future work in Peru and hold workshops with regional artists.

Marina Pallares-Elias will create two physical performances with indigenous communities (one with women and another with youth offenders) in Oaxaca, Mexico. The project will be one month long and we will use Lecoq and physical theatre languages.

Rebecca Fuller will travel to Malta to conduct a two-stage research and development trip, focusing on the expat experience before and after Article 50 was activated in March 2017. This will consist of interviews with expats in Malta and research on the impact British immigration has had on Maltese culture. Fuller will spend the second week working in a local pub on a performative research response.

Tess Seddon will conduct a research trip to Russia and Germany to challenge how she works as a director, to build international networks, and to research theatre in post-communist societies for a future show in 2019. She will spend a two week residency with Gob Squad in Berlin and a further two weeks with the Stanislavsky Electrotheatre in Moscow.

Theo TJ Lowe will undertake a two week residency with Estudio Danza Franisca Garcia in Chile. He will explore where the male mind and body stands in our current society and how the perception of masculinity and gender differs culturally between the UK to Chile.

Find out more:

> Read Rachael Nanyonjo’s blog about her AIDF supported trip to Uganda.   

> Read Nathan Jones's experience about his AIDF supported project in Berlin.

> See a case study about Luke Pell’s AIDF funded research in the USA.