Biography
Dr Nalina Wait is a lecturer in Dance at the Australian College of Physical Education (ACPE). She facilitates the ArtScience Lab at the MARCS Institute For Brain, Behaviour, and Development at Western Sydney University. She is a WAAPA alumna with a Bachelor of Arts (Dance), and 1st Hons and a Doctorate of Philosophy from UNSW (2020). She has had an extensive career as a dance artist working as a performer, choreographer, and filmmaker. As a performer, she has collaborated and performed in Sue Healey’s series: Niche, In Time, The Curiosities, and On View series (2003-present). Performing in On View: Panoramic Suite (Sydney 2021), On View: Panorama (Japan 2020), dance film En Route (2017), On View: Quintet (2016) winner of the Ausdance award for Outstanding Achievement Independent Dance 2016, Variant (2012) nominated for Ausdance award for Outstanding Achievement in Independent dance, dance film Alma and Ena (2010), dance film The Bed, the Chair, the Door and the Stairs (2009), The Curiosities (2009), Inevitable Scenarios (2006), dance films Three Times (2004), The Broken Heart (2004), Once In a Blue Moon (2005), and Fine Line (2003), winner of the Ausdance award for Best Film in 2003, first prize at Reeldance 2004 and first in the independent section of the Il Corgeografo Elettronico, Napolidanza Italy. Fine Line Terrain (2003) was nominated for two Ausdance awards in 2004, for Outstanding Performance by a Company and Outstanding Achievement in Choreography.
Nalina was a founding member of Sydney Performance Group (2006-2011) collaborating with Belgian choreographer Hans Van Den Broeck (SOIT) on the triptych HOMELAND (2011), NO-MADS (2008) and Settlement (2007). She danced in Rosalind Crisp's stella b. (1999-2002) performing in The View From Here (2000), Accumulation (1-40) (2000), Scrapbook Live (2001), Traffic and Kink (2001) which toured to Monty in Antwerp, Le Biennale Nationale de Danse Val-de-Marne and the CND, in Paris and Tanzfabric, Berlin. She performed in Lizzie Thomson’s works Panto (2010), and Stand Still (2004), with Clayton Thomas in Devastation Menu (2003) and was a member of Sandra Parker’s Dance Works in Melbourne (2002). Nalina also re-performed works by Joan Jonas and Marina Abramović in 13 Rooms (2013) and holds the embodiment of a Tino Sehgal work for Kaldor Public Art Projects.
Her own choreography often involves extensive collaboration with sound artists and includes dance film Sole (2003) dir. Andrew Wholley with Gail Priest, which screened in The Kinaesthetic Eye International Dance Cinema Festival in Minneapolis, in the Captured video dance series at the Dance Theatre Workshop in New York, the Tel-Aviv Cinematheque in Israel, nationally in Cinemoves and is held in the Reeldance Moving Image Collection, 2Dual (2005) and SADI (2007) with Gail Priest and Jane McKernan, Dual (2008) with Gail Priest, James Brown and Jane McKernan, Slow Riot (2010), Never Odd or Even (2011), The Empty Centre (2011) with James Brown, Choreomania (2011) with James Brown, Phosphene (2013) with Alister Spence, and The End of the Anthropocene (2019).
Photos by Wendell Teodoro, Andrew Wholley, and Heirdun Löhr (Parallax exhibition).
Dr Nalina Wait is a lecturer in Dance at the Australian College of Physical Education (ACPE). She facilitates the ArtScience Lab at the MARCS Institute For Brain, Behaviour, and Development at Western Sydney University. She is a WAAPA alumna with a Bachelor of Arts (Dance), and 1st Hons and a Doctorate of Philosophy from UNSW (2020). She has had an extensive career as a dance artist working as a performer, choreographer, and filmmaker. As a performer, she has collaborated and performed in Sue Healey’s series: Niche, In Time, The Curiosities, and On View series (2003-present). Performing in On View: Panoramic Suite (Sydney 2021), On View: Panorama (Japan 2020), dance film En Route (2017), On View: Quintet (2016) winner of the Ausdance award for Outstanding Achievement Independent Dance 2016, Variant (2012) nominated for Ausdance award for Outstanding Achievement in Independent dance, dance film Alma and Ena (2010), dance film The Bed, the Chair, the Door and the Stairs (2009), The Curiosities (2009), Inevitable Scenarios (2006), dance films Three Times (2004), The Broken Heart (2004), Once In a Blue Moon (2005), and Fine Line (2003), winner of the Ausdance award for Best Film in 2003, first prize at Reeldance 2004 and first in the independent section of the Il Corgeografo Elettronico, Napolidanza Italy. Fine Line Terrain (2003) was nominated for two Ausdance awards in 2004, for Outstanding Performance by a Company and Outstanding Achievement in Choreography.
Nalina was a founding member of Sydney Performance Group (2006-2011) collaborating with Belgian choreographer Hans Van Den Broeck (SOIT) on the triptych HOMELAND (2011), NO-MADS (2008) and Settlement (2007). She danced in Rosalind Crisp's stella b. (1999-2002) performing in The View From Here (2000), Accumulation (1-40) (2000), Scrapbook Live (2001), Traffic and Kink (2001) which toured to Monty in Antwerp, Le Biennale Nationale de Danse Val-de-Marne and the CND, in Paris and Tanzfabric, Berlin. She performed in Lizzie Thomson’s works Panto (2010), and Stand Still (2004), with Clayton Thomas in Devastation Menu (2003) and was a member of Sandra Parker’s Dance Works in Melbourne (2002). Nalina also re-performed works by Joan Jonas and Marina Abramović in 13 Rooms (2013) and holds the embodiment of a Tino Sehgal work for Kaldor Public Art Projects.
Her own choreography often involves extensive collaboration with sound artists and includes dance film Sole (2003) dir. Andrew Wholley with Gail Priest, which screened in The Kinaesthetic Eye International Dance Cinema Festival in Minneapolis, in the Captured video dance series at the Dance Theatre Workshop in New York, the Tel-Aviv Cinematheque in Israel, nationally in Cinemoves and is held in the Reeldance Moving Image Collection, 2Dual (2005) and SADI (2007) with Gail Priest and Jane McKernan, Dual (2008) with Gail Priest, James Brown and Jane McKernan, Slow Riot (2010), Never Odd or Even (2011), The Empty Centre (2011) with James Brown, Choreomania (2011) with James Brown, Phosphene (2013) with Alister Spence, and The End of the Anthropocene (2019).
Photos by Wendell Teodoro, Andrew Wholley, and Heirdun Löhr (Parallax exhibition).