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Priya Srinivasan
Dr Priya Srinivasan is a performer/choreographer/writer and the artistic director/co-founder of Sangam who lives and works on the lands of the Wurundjeri and Boonwurrung people in Narrm/Melbourne. Her practice is rooted in South Asian classical dance, prioritizing feminist decolonization processes, and making visible minority women’s histories. With a Ph.D. in performance studies from Northwestern University, Priya is the author of the award-winning book Sweating Saris: Indian Dance as Transnational Labour (Temple University Press, 2012) and was the first South Asian associate professor of dance at the University of California to be tenured. Her artistic work has been presented internationally in major festivals and venues in the United States, Europe, China, India and Australia. While living in Europe as a researcher and cultural advisor, Priya intervened in cultural policy in the Netherlands, particularly in the museum and arts sector, through large-scale and intimate projects collaborating on major projects with the Hermitage Museum, Amsterdam Museum, Korzo Theatre, Berlin Wall Memorial, Typografia Gallery Romania, and the Showroom Gallery London. She has curated, choreographed and performed solo, duet, ensemble and large-scale projects in partnership with Hermitage Museum Amsterdam, Berlin Wall Memorial, Rockbund Art Museum Shanghai, Dakshina Chitra and Spaces Chennai, Adishakti Puducherry, Highways Los Angeles, Bunjil Place, Artshouse, Dancehouse, Sydney Opera House, Australian Opera, The Melbourne Symphony Orchestra (MSO) and the Sidney Myer Music Bowl. More recently, she has premiered two groundbreaking works: The Durga Chronicles (Green Room Award winner for Breaking Ground) and Agam (part of Mosaics) with the MSO at the Sidney Myer Music Bowl to create decolonial, equitable, intercultural, multidisciplinary collaborations of artistic excellence that redefines music as dance, theatre and text. She has a work in progress called: The Copy of the Copy which questions ideas of appropriation between western and non-western art making and asks, ‘who profits?’. She has worked as the interim co-CEO of Multicultural Arts Victoria, advocating for equity and inclusion in the performance sector for diverse artists. Noticing the lack of South Asian performance through funded levels of excellence, her most important intervention came in 2019 as the artistic director of Sangam, which she founded as a corrective to the lack of opportunities for Indian and diaspora artists, enabling classical, contemporary, popular and experimental works on one platform. She has featured over three hundred artists and cultural workers from Indian and diaspora backgrounds, building opportunities for cultural participation and employment, which has enabled representational change for Indian and diaspora within high-level organizations in the arts sector such as Dancehouse, Asialink, Bunjil Place, ACMI, Australian Opera and the MSO to name a few.