Gideon Obarzanek
Gideon Obarzanek is a director, choreographer, performing arts curator. He is currently Co-Artistic Director & Co-CEO of the New Melbourne Festival.
When not making dance, Gideon has been Artistic Associate of the Melbourne Festival, co-curator of XO State at the inaugural Asia Pacific Triennial of Performing Arts (Asia TOPA), Strategic Cultural Engagement Manager at the University of Melbourne and Chair of the Melbourne Fringe Festival.
Gideon founded dance company Chunky Move in 1995 and was CEO and Artistic Director until 2012. His works for Chunky Move have been diverse in form and content including stage productions, installations, site-specific works, participatory events and film. These have been performed in many festivals and theatres around the world including Edinburgh International, BAM Next Wave, Venice Dance Biennale, Southbank London and all major Australian performing arts festivals.
In 2013 Gideon was a resident artist at the Sydney Theatre Company where he wrote and directed his first play I Want to Dance Better at Parties. He later co-wrote and directed a documentary screen version with filmmaker, Mathew Bate winning the 2014 Sydney Film Festival Dendy Award.
Recent creations include There’s Definitely a Prince Involved’ for the Australian Ballet, L’Chaim for the Sydney Dance Company and Two Jews Walk into a Theatre for Melbourne & Adelaide Festivals. In 2017 Gideon co-created Attractor with fellow choreographer, Lucy Guerin and Dancenorth. He later stage-directed Bangsokol – A requiem for Cambodia premiering at the 2017 Melbourne Festival and later at BAM Next Wave Festival, New York. Most recently, Gideon directed One Infinity, a collaboration between Chinese music ensemble, Jun Tian Fang, musician Genevieve Lacey, Beijing Dance Theatre & Dancenorth Australia for Melbourne, Sydney and Perth festivals.