Vivienne Rogis

A graduate of the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts (1994), Vivienne also has a Bachelor of Arts (Sociology/Italian Language) 2006, and a Masters in Visual Culture Research Methods from the Australian National University, 2011. Vivienne performs, teaches and choreographs for a variety of companies, artists and groups locally, nationally and internationally.

Vivienne is currently the manager and curator of Dance Hub Knox , a professional development and networking project in the outer eastern suburbs of Melbourne, the coordinator of the dance program & secretary for the PAVE Festival, in Emerald, Victoria & the producer of a site-specific arts professional development and presentation platform called Circling the Brink . Vivienne continues to create new choreographic works. Her present focus is on non-traditional venues and contexts for dance, developing short dance installations, site specific dance films and longer works in diverse contexts. In 2016 she is creating a new solo dance work called, The Whole Cake, with support from the Yarra Ranges Council via their arts and heritage grants program.

Vivienne is a founding member of Mirramu Dance Company. She has been working with Elizabeth Cameron Dalman for nearly 20 years. Having had the opportunity to pursue her own work alongside a very deep and constant creative relationship with Elizabeth Cameron Dalman performing both her early and contemporary works, Vivienne is very interested in the historical lineage of movement as it exists in the present day bodies of contemporary artists. In 2015 Vivienne assisted Elizabeth Cameron Dalman to remount important Australian historical dance works from the early repertoire of Australian Dance Theatre on students at VCASS (Victorian College of the Arts Secondary School). She also performed with Mirramu Dance Company in the 50th Anniversary celebrations of Elizabeth Cameron Dalman’s choreographic life (Fortuity) and the performance celebration of the founding of Australian Dance Theatre (The L Project).

Cross-cultural collaborations have always been an integral part of Mirramu Dance Company. As a company member Vivienne has travelled to Taiwan, Japan and Europe and worked with artists from these countries, as well as with Indigenous Australian artists. She has pursued her own creative relationships with artists from Taiwan and Japan. In 2002 Vivienne travelled to Japan to study Mobius Kiryuho with Master Kajo Tsuboi and Kyoko Sato. She has continued to work with them as the opportunities arise.

In 2004 she was the recipient of an artsACT grant and an Australia China Council residency at the Taipei International Artist Village to begin a cross-cultural site specific dance film. This was completed in 2005 with an Arts NSW supported residency at Mirramu Creative Arts Centre where she collaborated with Taiwanese artist, Mia Hsieh. Taiwanese artists have participated in her current site specific arts program called Circling the Brink. Most recently Vivienne was part of Mirramu Dance Company projects that involved members from Dancecology and she performed with Elizabeth Cameron Dalman in the 2015 Tsai Jui Yueh International Dance Festival in Taipei.

Vivienne has been an active independent artist since she graduated from WAAPA in 1994. She began teaching, performing and choreographing in WA in 1995. She moved to the ACT in 1997 where she received artsACT support for a number of years to develop a multimedia dance work called Liquid Centre. Vivienne was involved with the development and delivery of youth dance programs at The Australian Choreographic Centre from 1998 – 2007 and fulfilled the role of Assistant to the Artistic Director of QL2 Centre for Youth Dance from 2008 – 2010. She was a board member of Ausdance ACT for a number of years and in 2005 Vivienne was a lecturer in dance at the University of Western Sydney.

In July 2005 Vivienne travelled to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, to give a theoretical paper on Dance and Globalisation at the WDA Asia Pacific International Dance Conference. In 2011 Vivienne continued to develop her work in dance film, completing a narrative dance film, called Gentle Spirit with support from artsACT.

Vivienne moved to Melbourne in 2011 and in 2013 was commissioned to create a new work on the 2nd Year students at VCA. She is currently launching Dance ARC a youth dance organisation in the outer eastern suburbs of Melbourne.