The International Workshop Series for Emerging Theatre Leaders

Yvette Hardie is a theatre producer, director, educator, and writer active in the world of theatre and performance, with a particular focus on theatre for young audiences. She initiated the launch of ASSITEJ SA (the national centre of the International Association of Theatre for Children and Young People) in 2007, and leads the organisation in the capacity of National Director. She served as elected President of the international ASSITEJ from 2011-2021. She has now stepped down from this position and is an Honorary President of the association. She serves as Deputy Chairperson for the STAND Foundation and for Im4theArts. In all these capacities, she creates opportunities for artistic exchange, mentorship, skills development and cross-cultural collaboration across the world, while working to invigorate the South African theatrical landscape with work of the highest quality and widest accessibility. She writes and speaks extensively on issues relating to arts for young audiences, arts education and arts for reconciliation and conflict resolution at events around the world. In 2019, she was awarded the Mickey Miner Award for Lifetime Achievement from IPAY (International Performing Arts for Youth), based in Philadelphia, USA, for her contribution to theatre for young audiences locally and globally.

Magda Romanska is an Executive Director and Editor-in-Chief of TheTheatreTimes.com, the largest global digital theatre portal. She is also a Principal at metaLAB (at) Harvard, the Chair of Transmedia Arts seminar at Harvard University Mahindra Humanities Center, where she curates a series of lectures on transmediality, and Professor of Theatre at Emerson College. In 2019, she also launched Performap.org – an interactive digital map of theatre festivals, funded through Yale Digital Humanities Lab and LMDA Innovation Grant; and IOTF: International Online Theatre Festival – a year streaming global theatre event. In 2021, the IOTF won a second-place Culture Online International Award for “Best Online Project,” chosen among 452 projects from 20 countries. Romanska is a recipient of 2018 Elliott Hayes Award for Outstanding Achievement in Dramaturgy. She is also recipient of Aquila Polonica Prize from Polish Studies Association, Gerald Kahan Scholar’s Prize from American Society for Theatre Research, and Creative Arts Prize from Polish American Historical Association. She is the author or editor of five critically acclaimed theatre books, including The Post-traumatic Theatre of Grotowski and Kantor (2012); TheaterMachine: Tadeusz Kantor in Context (2020, co-edited with Kathleen Cioffi); Reader in Comedy: An Anthology of Theory and Criticism (2016, co-edited with Alan Ackerman); and The Routledge Companion to Dramaturgy, a leading and best-selling handbook of dramaturgy. She is also the sole editor of a series Focus on Dramaturgy from Routledge. She’s a graduate of Stanford, and of Cornell’s doctoral program. She has taught theatre, dramaturgy, and transmedia at Harvard University, Yale School of Drama, Cornell University, and Emerson College.

Sir Jonathan Mills AO is a prominent Australian-born composer and festival director, who resides in the UK. In the 1990s he worked in the Architecture Faculty of RMIT University in Melbourne, leading courses in acoustic design. He is the composer of several award-winning operas and works for chamber ensemble and orchestra. His opera Eternity Man was recognised by a Genesis Foundation commission in 2003 and his oratorio Sandakan Threnody won the Prix Italia in 2005. He has been director of various music and multi-arts festivals in Australia and also in the UK, where he was the director of the Edinburgh International Festival between 2007 and 2014. He is currently Director of the Edinburgh International Culture Summit, a UNESCO-recognised biennial meeting held in conjunction with Edinburgh’s summer festivals and is the current President of the EFFE International Jury. EFFE (Europe for Festivals, Festivals for Europe) was initiated by the European Festivals Association. Jonathan is visiting Professor at the University of Edinburgh and Vice Chancellor’s (Professorial) Fellow at the University of Melbourne. His work has been recognised by awards from the governments of Australia, Britain, France, Poland and South Korea.

Alicia B. Adams is the Vice President of International Programming and Dance at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C. She joined the Kennedy Center in the 90s, first serving as Special Assistant to the Chairman, James Wolfensohn. She worked with the Chairman to augment, articulate, coordinate and oversee implementation of the Center’s programs and policies. Adams now curates major international festivals as well as contemporary theatre and dance programs. For more than two decades, Adams’ role at the Center has been producing and presenting work from the national and international arenas. Over the past years she has produced international theatre series, Spotlight on Directors and Celebrating Bergman at 100 including directors Liv Ullmann and Ivo van Hove. Most recently she launched ARTES DE CUBA: From the Island to the World, an unprecedented festival that brought together 400 Cuban and Cuban American artists. She also curated and produced Ireland 100 (2016), celebrating the Centennial of the Easter Rising, the Center’s IBERIAN SUITE: global arts remix (2015), WORLD STAGES: International Theater Festival 2014, as well as the Nordic Cool 2013, maximumINDIA (2011) and ARABESQUE: Arts of the Arab World (2009) festivals, celebration of the arts and culture of the Nordic region, India and the Arab world respectively. She also planned and programmed China: The Art of a Nation (2011), ON THE FRINGE: Eye on Edinburgh (2010), JAPAN! culture + hyperculture (2008) and the month-long Festival of China (2005), the largest celebration Chinese arts and culture in American history. She also curated the Center’s four-year initiative on Africa, African Odyssey (1997-2000) and the Latin American festival AmericArtes (2001-2004). In addition to major international festivals, Adams also curates the Center’s Contemporary Dance and the World Stages series. She has worked in the field of arts management in New York City for institutions including Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, Belafonte Enterprises, Inc., City Center Theater, Harlem School of the Arts and International Production Associates. She serves as Chair of the Trustees of International Society for the Performing Arts(ISPA), as a Trustees of the Williamstown Theater Festival in Massachusetts, Trustee and Founding Council member of the Caine Prize for African Writing( UK), Africa 95 Trustee, Trustee for Chinese Cultural Institute founded by Shirley Young, Former Advisory Board member for the All Roads Film Project of National Geographic, Advisory Board member for Harlem School of the Arts, Trustee of the Association of Performing Arts Presenters (APAP), and six years on the National Dance Panel of the New England Foundation on the Arts. Adams is a member of the Advisory Council for Georgetown University's Laboratory for Global Performance and Politics. She is also an elected member of the Cosmos Club. In 2011 she received the APAP Fan Taylor Distinguished Service Award for exemplary service to the field of presenting. She was honoured by The Center for Democracy in the Americas as the 2018 Champion of U.S. -Cuba Engagement. In 2013, Adams was awarded the Insignia of Member First Class of the Royal Order of the Polar Star by the Swedish government. In 2014, Adams was awarded Insignia of Knight, First Class, of the Order of the Lion of Finland by the Finnish government. In 2022, she was elected as a member to the Council on Foreign Relations. Adams has a Master of Arts degree from Columbia University and a Bachelor of Science degree from New York University. She holds a certificate in arts administration from Harvard University’s School of Business Administration.