Matthew Lutton – 2026 Travel Diary
Art Radar
Our Artistic Director, Matthew Lutton, has been travelling the globe, seeking out some of the most exciting and innovative work being created across theatre, performance, music and visual art.
What connects all of these artists is a commitment to invention, creating work that challenges assumptions, expands possibility and invites audiences to see the world differently.
The future of performance feels ambitious, generous, strange and full of possibility.
Brazilian Theatre Directors
There is an inventive wave of theatre currently emerging from Brazilian theatre makers, including directors such as Carolina Bianchi, Christiane Jatahy, Andrea Jimenez and Janaina Leite. Each of these directors approaches theatre with immense intellect and visceral passion. I recently saw Janaian Leite’s response to the pornographic novel "Story of the Eye," which expands the boundaries of representation in theatre and creates an incredibly tender and beautiful space for expression and freedom.
Marie Brassard and Robert Lepage
Since I began making theatre twenty years ago in Perth, I have been drawn to two French-Canadian artists, Robert Lepage and Marie Brassard, who are master storytellers with an incredible instinct for invention.It was thrilling to meet both of them recently.
Marie has created a new solo show, L’Ether, and is remounting her ground-breaking work Jimmy, which features a hallucinatory figure trapped in the dreams of others.
Robert Lepage is currently developing a new piece that reflects on the story of Gaëtan Dugas, the man incorrectly labelled "Patient Zero" (the individual some accuse of bringing the AIDS epidemic from Canada to America in the 1970s).
“this new production promises to be visually stunning, filled with heart and insight.”
Vampire’s Mountain
Philippe Quesne is a French theatre maker renowned in Europe who has yet to perform in Australia. He is known for his visual theatre, which often carries a satirical bent. I saw his work comparing American cowboys to European wilderness adventurers years ago in Munich, and I recently attended his production, Vampire's Mountain, at the Vienna Festival. This production imagines a world where humanity has ended, leaving behind bored vampires who break into a theatre to role-play the delights of discovering various landscapes that we once enjoyed.
Caroline Guiela Nguyen
If you ask any festival director for a theatre director who should be on your radar, everyone will mention Caroline Guiela Nguyen. The French-Vietnamese director is the Artistic Director of the only nationally funded French company outside of Paris, the National Theatre of Strasbourg. Every one of her works is immaculately researched, written and directed. Her latest piece, Valentina, is a beautiful fairy tale about the daughter of a Romanian mother who conjures a miracle when her mother is diagnosed with heart cancer. I continue to reflect on the beauty that Nguyen is able to manifest in her work.
Brecht’s First Play
Currently, there are many extraordinary collaborations occurring with Chinese artists, but one that stands out to me is the partnership between the Irish company Dead Centre and the Beijing Repertoire Theatre, titled Brecht’s First Play. They take Brecht’s play, Baal (which he wrote at 20 and, as they say, “is not a great play”), and transform it into an extraordinary work that addresses cancel culture and illustrates how cancelling an outsider often amplifies their values and views.
