_{Cover Image: Cass Mortimer Eipper and Charmene Yap. Image by Bonnie Hansen.}

Two partners in dance and life with strong ties to Western Australia will take the artistic helm of our major contemporary dance company from next January.

Charmene Yap and Cass Mortimer Eipper have been named Co-Artistic Directors of Co3 Contemporary Dance Australia, replacing inaugural Artistic Director Raewyn Hill.

Hill leaves her post in December after 12 years of creating and presenting award-winning new works and establishing Co3’s reputation as one of Australia’s leading contemporary dance companies.

Yap and Mortimer Eipper have forged distinguished careers together and individually, and they are thrilled about taking on their new joint-role in Perth and about returning with their two young children to the city where their professional lives took flight.

“This isn’t simply a move west for us,” Yap said. “Western Australia shaped us both as artists, so the opportunity to return and lead Co3 together means a great deal. We’re excited to reconnect with the dance community, work alongside dancers and artists across the state, and to build on this company’s foundations with care.”

Yap moved from Sydney after high school to study dance at the WA Academy of Performing Arts and Melbourne-born Mortimer Eipper began his dance career with WA Ballet, where he choreographed several works before co-founding the Perth-based dance and media company Ludwig.

They bring complementary skills to their shared role. Beyond their choreographic talents, Yap has extensive experience in dancer development, youth and education, and Mortimer Eipper’s work extends into film, installation and other digital media.

Outgoing Co3 Chair Margrete Helgeby Chaney said the Board’s decision to appoint co-artistic leaders reflected the pair’s calibre and their vision for the company.

The new artistic leadership comes at a pivotal time as Helgeby Chaney hands over the Chair to longtime cultural leader Julian Donaldson this month.

The transition culminates nearly 20 years of Helgeby Chaney’s leadership in working to establish and maintain Co3 as WA’s first contemporary dance company since the Chrissie Parrott Dance Company folded in 1996. Helgeby Chaney was a driving force in the State Government’s 2008 Future Moves dance reforms that led to the founding of Co3 in 2014 and she has guided its growth since then.

In stepping down, she said that Co3 was entering its next phase from a position of strength, stability and artistic confidence.

“Charmene and Cass are two of the most awarded and respected dance artists this country has produced, and both have Western Australia running through their creative DNA,” Helgeby Chaney said. “Between them, they bring three Helpmann Awards, an Australian Dance Award and a West Australian Dance Award, careers spanning our leading dance companies, theatre, opera, film and public-space work — and, critically, a long-standing creative partnership of their own.

“Theirs is a proven collaboration built on complementary strengths and shared vision, and the Board has every confidence they will take Co3 somewhere thrillingly new as they continue to build on Co3’s present strengths and programs.”

Their co-directorship echoes models at several other Australian companies including Dancenorth, led by Kyle Page and Amber Haines, Marrugeku (Dalisa Pigram and Rachael Swain) and at WA’s STRUT Dance, where Sofie Burgoyne and James O’Hara are Co-Artistic Directors.

The appointment of Yap and Mortimer Eipper brings to mind life-partners Graeme Murphy and Janet Vernon, who for 31 years led Sydney Dance Company, where Yap and Mortimer Eipper danced together and created their own works. Yap is currently SDC’s Rehearsal Associate working on creative development, staging and dancer development.

Beyond SDC, Yap has performed with Chunky Move, Lucy Guerin Inc, Dancenorth and Tasdance, and her other creative credits as choreographer, rehearsal director and movement director include Sydney Theatre Company, Belvoir and Opera Australia. Mortimer Eipper’s work has been presented by SDC, WA Ballet, Bangarra Dance Theatre and Australian Dance Theatre, and through RISING and Vivid Sydney, among others. His international commissions include Les Grands Ballets Canadiens de Montréal and Milwaukee Ballet.

Their creative partnership was on full display at the 2022 Sydney Festival where they premiered their collaborative work Grey Rhino, a large-scale and high-energy combination of dance, original music and kinetic design produced by Performing Lines.

Ahead of moving from Sydney over the summer, Yap and Mortimer Eipper will be in Perth for a series of events including handover talks, meetings with local artists and stakeholders and a two-day workshop.

They affirmed their commitment to Co3’s three pillars of focus: performance through mainstage productions and tours; engagement through its youth program; and pathways to support artists.

“We really want to build on the strong foundations Raewyn has already put together,” Yap said. “There are so many wonderful things that Co3 are already doing like the education programs, the pathways for independent artists and of course the performance quality. We are absolutely set on building on these and continuing to push further as much as we can.”

Mortimer Eipper said the pair had gained an appreciation of WA’s unique culture, stories and creative identity shaped by its distinct place in the world. “We think it’s important that the company represents a voice that could come from nowhere else,” he said. “We know it’s important to invest in the artists, nurture the ecosystem and help expand that voice for national and international audiences.

“Contemporary dance is a medium we want more people to experience, and so we need to work with other organisations, both in educational and professional spaces, to make sure that we are amplifying it voice and accessing more people.”

Their co-artistic leadership will share responsibility for Co3’s artistic vision, ensemble practice, commissioning and programming. They will co-choreograph major ensemble works and jointly curate and commission artists across the season, commencing in 2028.

Hill will stay involved with Co3 as Creative Fellow and present her next world-premiere work in the 2027 program to be announced later this year before she steps down. Hill said she was delighted to see Co3’s next chapter entrusted to “two exceptional artists whose creative partnership is founded on collaboration, generosity and a shared vision for what dance can be”.

Co3