12 Australian Choreographers
Dance Archive
Onsite
Dance On Screen
Back To Realtime
realtimedance

russell dumas

Brisbane-born Russell Dumas trained in a number of dance styles in Australia and overseas including classical ballet, and the Graham and Cunningham techniques. He began his performing career in musical comedy with the J.C Williamson organisation and later danced with a wide variety of English and European companies including the London Festival Ballet, Ballet Rambert, Nederlands Dans Theater, the Royal Ballet, Culberg Ballet, Strider and in the US with Trisha Brown and Twyla Tharp.

In 1976 Dumas founded the Sydney-based company Dance Exchange with Nanette Hassall, which he continues to direct. In 1985 he established the Dancelink program, bringing many dance teachers and artists to Australia. His interests have encompassed not only choreography, performance and film but critical analysis and writing as well. [Text from Australian National Library.]

More detailed information about the career and other works of Russell Dumas, one of Australia's most respected and influential choreographers, will be added to this site in due course. Editors.

works by russell dumas

interviews

shadow boxing
philipa rothfield, realtime 27, october-november, 1998

body regimes
longer version available here
realtime 44, august-september 2001

performance space: some defining moments
julie-anne long, realtime 64, december 2004-january 2005

forum: wanted: creative producers
realtime, august 8, 2005

articles/reviews: other works by russell dumas

…and yet, 1995
hybrid or not
jacqueline milner, realtime 9, october-november, 1995

absence and yet presence
eleanor brickhill, realtime 9, october-november, 1995

dumas in indonesia, 1997
sandy edwards & russell dumas in indonesia
virginia baxter, realtime 19, june-july, 1997

oak’s café, 1997
outside outward display: tradition and the derivative
eleanor brickhill, realtime 19, june-july, 1997

stored roots, staked histories
zsuzsanna soboslay, realtime 30, april-may, 1999

cargo cult, 1998
cultures dancing
eleanor brickhill, realtime 23, feburary-march, 1998

cassandra’s dance, 1999
stored roots, staked histories
zsuzsanna soboslay, realtime 30, april-may, 1999

don’t fence me in
anne thompson, realtime 31, june-july, 1999

reclaiming dance as innovator
erin brannigan, realtime 31, june-july, 1999

post larret 99, 1999
bodyworks: the politics of the embrace
jonathan marshall, realtime 35, february-march, 2000

love is blind, 2014
A realm of exquisite sensitivity
jessica sabatini, realtime 121, June-July 2014

articles/reviews: other publications

feeling feelings, the work of russell dumas through whitehead’s process and reality
philippa rothfield, inflexions no.2, nexus, december 2008

evolving movements that flow through time and into infinity
roslyn sulcas, new york times, october 12, 2010

dancing on the small screen: politics of space in russell dumas’s 321
sally gardner, halfway house: the poetics of australian spaces, ed j rutherford and barbara holloway, melbourne: UWA publishing, 2010, 215-222

russell dumas, a tree from any direction
billy crawford, the performance space quarterly, 2, winter 1994,14-16

russell dumas: on film
deborah jowitt, writings on dance, no.17, winter 1997, 1-14

an interview with russell dumas,
elizabeth dempster, writings on dance, no.5, 1990, 9-26

dancing with russell dumas: some working notes
sally gardner, writings on dance, no.21, 2001/02, 63-66

Thumbnail: Russell Dumas' The Oaks Café/Casandra’s Dance, photo Lesley Solar