Jess Devereux

Jess Devereux is a choreographer, dancer and community artist. Jess studied dance at the Victorian College of the Arts, graduating with a BA Dance (1st class Honours in ‘08.) Performance and movement research have included collaborations with Simon Ellis, Luke Hockley, Caley O’Neil, Susan van den Ham, Elen David, Rochelle Carmichael, Fritz Hauser and Adam Wheeler. Jess makes dance films with Zoe Scoglio and Mischa Baka, and most recently joined forces with Zoe Scoglio, producing dance film TO CLAY in the beautiful Ilparpa Clay Pans of Alice Springs, collaborating with Dusty Feet Dance Collective.

From ‘09-‘12 Jess has been working seasonally with Tracks Dance Company in tropical Darwin NT, as Dance Animateur. Jess works with Tracks across performance, training and direction of new dance works and choreographic development projects. She also travels with the team yearly to the remote Indigenous community of Lajamanu in the Tanami Desert for the Milpirri Project, teaching dance classes to Indigenous youth and sharing in Warlpiri culture with the Yawalyu Ceremonial Dancers.

In ‘11 Jess undertook professional development in South East Asia, learning traditional Legong movement in Ubud, then onward to Europe for choreographic residencies at P-AF France and Mosaico Danza Italy with Gabrielle Rose, followed by intensive movement training at ImpulsTanz Vienna from Gavin Webber, Andrew Harwood, Ko Murobushi, Isabel Lewis, Marta Coronado, David Zambrano, Keith Hennessy and Doric Uhlich. Jess has received funding from local, state and national funding bodies to develop her work.

Jess’ recent performance credits include: full length solo 'Silver Sky' Darwin Festival ’12, 'Shallow End' Darwin Festival ‘12, 'Love Hunter' Melbourne Fringe ’10 'Seamstress' Melbourne Fringe ’08 and 'Cossie' Coming Out Dancehouse ’08. Major choreographic credits with Tracks Dance Company include: '8-80 The Architecture of Age' ’12, 'The Allure of Paradise' ’10, 'The Cook, The Queen & The Kelly' ‘10, 'Endurance' ’09 and four Choreographic Development Programs, mentoring emerging NT choreographers.

Jess is passionate about making and supporting dance, and contributes to community arts projects, most notably for City of Melbourne, Corrugated Iron Youth Arts and Footscray Community Arts Centre. Jess is currently based in her hometown Melbourne, continuing her dance practice and choreographic explorations, and is on the Curatorial Advisory Committee for NEXT WAVE 2013-14. Jess recently performed at Sydney Festival in Tim Humphrey and Madeleine Flynn’s beautiful outdoor installation The Megaphone Project, and danced in Aphids FUN RUN.

In 2013, Jess will continue to develop her independent choreographic work, and will join Tracks for two new dance works- 'Future Age' (a curated season of works for the Grey Panthers dance group for women over the age of 60) and 'Zombies in the Banyan Tree' (Festival show merging breakdance, traditional Balinese folk dance and contemporary dance forms, accompanied by original, live music created by a beatboxer and a 30-piece Kecak dance choir.)