The biennial Keith Bain Choreographic Travel Fellowship supports international travel and experiences by emerging choreographers (under 40 years) across any dance genre.
This year's fellowship has been temporarily postponed, but potential applicants are advised to check this website and Ausdance National's social media for updates and the call for applications.
Key information
Fellowship amount: Up to $5000
For: Emerging choreographers (under 40 years)
Purpose: Supports international travel for professional development
Applications close: Date to be advised.
Once nominations have been called for, email your application to Ausdance National with ‘Keith Bain Fellowship’ in the subject line.
Your application should include:
- a brief proposal (no more than 800 words) discussing how you will develop your choreographic practice through a specific international professional development experience
- a CV and biography
- a link to a sample of work (3–6 minutes of continuous choreography)
- two references.
Applicants must be an Australian citizen or resident and an Ausdance member.
The successful applicant will:
- report and reflect on your fellowship activities during or after the fellowship. The report may be in the form of a blog, an article or work diary, a recorded showing or a forum. Your application must include a plan for reporting on your activities.
- complete the travel within two years of receiving the fellowship. The funds may be used over that time for complementary professional development activities such as attendance at international conferences or to undertake classes or partnerships outside of Australia.
Previous recipients
Offering both the gift of time and travel, the Keith Bain Choreographic Travel Fellowship enabled me to scrutinise the conceptual and practical methods with which I create. It assisted me to connect with current international discourse on identity, agency and performance, and to meet some fascinating artists along the way. — Gabrielle Nankivell, 2014 recipient
2014 recipient Gabrielle Nankivell researched dramaturgy in Vienna. Gabrielle Nankivell was awarded the fellowship in 2014. Gabrielle has been creating and performing nationally and internationally since 2000. She has a distinctive and ever-shifting aesthetic as she discovers new methods and influences, and her current desire to move into dance dramaturge is a natural progression for her evolution as a dance and theatre maker. She is an articulate and diverse dance maker who believes in communication through movement. The panel feels confident that Gabrielle's proposal to further investigate how we use dance and movement to engage with the world around us would have been greatly supported by Keith.
Patrick (Lucky) Lartey was awarded the fellowship in 2016. Lucky is a Sydney-based dancer and choreographer, originally from Ghana, West Africa. In 2017 Lucky used the Fellowship to travel to Ankata in BoBo, Burkina Faso, West Africa to complete a four-week dance residency with Serge Aime Coulibaly, the artistic director of Faso Dance Theatre—a creative space for meetings, reflection and research on contemporary choreography.
Lewis Major was awarded the fellowship in 2018. Lewis has designed a program of mentorship and career development activities designed to build his professional networks and further develop skills in dramaturgy, choreography and independent producing in an international context. The program includes activities to strengthen his choreographic and broader artistic development and practice by facilitating face-to-face dialogue and creative output with international artistic collaborators.
About Keith
Keith Bain OAM was a founding member of Ausdance and held state and national committee roles for many years, including Ausdance National President 1988–1991. It was Keith who suggested the name ‘Ausdance’ when the organisation changed its name in 1992, and who initiated the annual Dancers' Picnic, which has evolved into the Australian Dance Awards.
Keith was the inaugural director of movement at NIDA, and he received many honours and awards during his lifetime, including the Queen Elizabeth Silver Jubilee Medal for services to dance and theatre (1977), an Order of Australia Medal (1988) and Australian Dance Awards for Lifetime Achievement (1999) and Services to Dance Education (2003). He received the dance industry's esteemed honour of induction into the Australian Dance Awards Hall of Fame in 2011.
Keith passed away on 4 July 2012. In his will, he left a bequest to Ausdance National to provide financial assistance for a promising young choreographer to travel internationally with the sole purpose of developing and extending existing choreographic practices.
(Clockwise from top left:) Keith leading rehearsal for Jesus Christ Superstar, 1972 Photo by Greg Desmond; Keith with Coralie Hinkley in Gertrud Bodenwieser's Central Australian Suite, 1957 Photo by Max Dupain; Keith helping Ruth Cracknell with the bossa nova for a movie directed by Jim Sharman titled The Night Prowler, 1977; NIDA tribute to Keith, 2005 Photo by Branca Gaica (with Anca Frankenhaeuser at rear and Shirley McKechnie)