Meet the 2022 Team

Agnese Perri

Executive Producer

Agnese Perri (they/she) is an emerging multidisciplinary theatre maker and producer in the final year of their BFA (Theatre) at the VCA. From Italy and Hong Kong but currently based in Naarm, they’re interest lies in theatre, performance art, and festival producing.

They’re drawn to rich sensory experiences, multimedia, and whimsical childlike atmospheres & language with adult themes. They explore autobiographical/semi autobiographical narratives, culture, cross-cultural experiences, isolation, connection, and community.

Recent projects include My Shell (2022), Always a Stranger in a Foreign Place (2021), and Hong Kong in Red (2019). Performance credits include extensive work with the Hong Kong Youth Arts Foundation, FLOOD with National Youth Theatre UK, and VCA performances. Executive Producing MUSE is their debut role as a producer.

Iris Simpson

Co-Artistic Director

Iris Osprey Simpson (she/her) is a multidisciplinary theatre-maker and writer living on Wurundjeri land in Melbourne. She’s a worldbuilder and a magic-maker, driven to create immersive theatre that gives the audience agency and a sense of wonder for the everyday. She’s interested in the athropocene, in finding magic in an increasingly unstable world, and in how theatre might become a meeting place for communities to come together. Iris’s practice is research led, beginning with stories and artefacts from the world around us, before moving in to collaborative, play based making.

Iris’s recent works include And the Dragons, an immersive audio experience, A.K.A, a digital interactive story, and SALT, an immersive choral work.

MUSE is her first role as an artistic director, and she hopes to work in community led festivals in the future.

Sophia Derkenne

Co-Artistic Director

Living in Naarm/Melbourne, Sophia (she/her) is a multidisciplinary artist in her final year of the BFA (Theatre) at the VCA. Moving from Worimi country in regional NSW in order to pursue theatre training and a career, Sophia is very conscious of the importance of financial and geographical access to contemporary art forms and experiences.

Sophia is captured by immersive, interactive work that is collaborative, and centres responses of the body. She is excited by the possibilities of theatre to transform space outside of traditional theatres and offer broader audiences including children and regional communities unique sensory experience and moments of magic.

Works include “Transference” (2022), “Ratking” (2021 dir. Katy Maudlin), “tacit; work in progress” (2021, codevised with Jett Chudleigh and Lauren Swain.) Sophia also works with Polyglot Theatre in production assistant capacities, fostering her learning of child led arts.

Vitoria Hronopoulous

Artist Development Manager

Vitoria Hronopoulos (she/her) is an Australian/Greek, Naarm based Actor, Theatre Maker and comedy Content Creator (2wigs). She is currently completing her BFA in Theatre at VCA. Her practice sits at an intersection between movement, comedy and character. She’s most creatively juiced, when in serious play and improvisational spaces. Vitoria is a developing director and choreographer. She has trained in Dance and is a Melbourne Taekwondo Centre, black belt recipient. Recent credits: solo show ‘Aνοιχτα Ματια (Open Eyes)’ Directed by Vitoria Hronopoulos at Testing Grounds and ‘SLUTNIK’ written and produced by Flick, Directed by Tansy Gorman for MidSumma Festival at St Kilda’s Theatre Works.

Benjamin Smith

Program Manager

Hailing from the little island down south, Ben (he/him) is an avid theatre maker, director and performer. He is currently in his final year at the VCA (Acting), and has previously studied at the Tasmanian Conservatorium of Music. Ben has worked for various arts organisations around Australia including Dark Mofo and the Adelaide Fringe.

He is a passionate supporter of emerging artists and new works, especially those that showcase diverse and often underrepresented stories and is thrilled to be part of the MUSE team.

Lauren Swain

Program Assistant

Lauren Swain (she/they) is a proud Dabee Wiradjuri person with mixed anglo heritage, currently based in Naarm on Wurundjeri Country. She grew up in the town of Cooma in the Mountains of Ngarigo Country (Snowy Mountains, NSW). Their upbringing in a rural community underpins an artistic practice that is grounded in: community consciousness, collaboration, inclusion and working with what you’ve got. Lauren is a Third year Theatre maker at the VCA, whose practice is multidisciplinary and weaves between performer, collaborator and facilitator. Lauren is interested in non-traditional theatre that is responsive to non-conventional spaces. Movement led, interactive, participatory, and immersive forms that blur the line between performer and audience. Lauren is a maker of all sorts, loves a crafternoon, never says no to a boogie, tells stories, brings people together over a good cheese board, and shares their love for play, people and Country.
Works include: “Now Hiring” (2022), ‘Veronica Franco vs Instagram’ (dir. Lisa Radford and Sam George), Director in Ilbijerri Theatre Companies 10 in 10 project (2021), Production assistant in Polyglot Theatre Companies “Boats” (2022), and “tacit; work in progress” (2021, codevised with Jett Chudleigh and Sophia Derkenne).

Freyja Black

Marketing Coordinator

Freyja Black (she/her) is an emerging actor, musician and theatre-maker based in Naarm/Melbourne, currently in her last year of a BFA Theatre at the Victorian College of the Arts. Freyja is passionate about rich sensory works particularly using auditory experience.

Some of Freyja’s recent works include ‘Veronica Franco vs Instagram’ (dir. Lisa Radford and Sam George, 2022), ‘Look at it in the Light’ (Freyja Black, 2022) and ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ (dir. Nicola Bowman, Melbourne Shakespeare Company 2022).

Tyallah Bullock

Photographer & Videographer (Marketing)

Tyallah Bullock (She/They) is a Naarm/Melbourne-based aboriginal actor, writer and creator currently studying a Bachelor of Fine Arts Acting at the Victorian College of the Arts. Within their studies they've portrayed the roles of 'Marianne' in Tales from the Vienna Woods by Horváth, Sasha' in Slaughterhouse and 'Nina' in the Seagull. Best known for her roles as Clara Makin (Haptin the Musical- QLD Premiere, OZ Theatricals, Nora (The Wandering- Frostover Films) Bea Here there be Monsters- Screen QLD- Drew McDonald, Mia - Miss Nothing - Richard Mildren. She's also the winner of Best Actress Tropfest Jr 2019.

Creative Team: Team Members

Acknowledgements

MUSE would like to thank the following people for their support. Their generosity and hard work made the festival possible, and we couldn't have done it without them.

David Harrod, Chris Mead, Ounie Witherow Aitken, Duraan Reid,, Candy Cooper, Eugene MacKinnon, Vincenzo Perri, and Whimbrel Wilson.