Superluminal

Geoff Cobham is the Artistic Director of Patch Theatre and one of Australia’s leading culture professionals, with over 40 years’ experience collaborating in all forms of theatre.

His artistic reputation both nationally and internationally comes from an outstanding multi-award-winning career working with several of Australia’s foremost arts organisations and events. He spent ten years as Associate Director of dance theatre Force Majeure, five years as resident designer at State Theatre Company South Australia and has worked in senior management roles at Sydney Festival, Adelaide Festival and WOMAD.

Geoff founded Bluebottle in 1998, an award-winning lighting design company which integrates outstanding lighting design into theatres, galleries, installations, architecture, exhibitions and music.

He has a long and notable history with Patch Theatre, having worked on a variety of productions including The Fastest Boy, Emily Loves to Bounce and Me & My Shadow before taking the reins as Artistic Director in 2018. While at Patch, Geoff has created in-theatre works ZOOOM, I Wish…, and Home and installation works The Lighthouse, Sea of Light, and Mirror Mirror.

Zoë is an acclaimed cellist, composer, sound artist, performance maker and educator. She creates chamber music, scores for film, theatre & dance, gallery sound installations and immersive theatre experiences for intergenerational audiences. She collaborates with leading theatre & sound makers across Australia and internationally. Zoë works across traditional performance spaces, found spaces, and the digital world. Her process is collaborative, relational and reflective, exploring an ongoing inquiry into the politics of slowness, amplifying quiet voices, and relational experiences.

Michelle 'Maddog' Delaney is a maker of things. Places, spaces, feelings and things – forests in disused buildings, themed bars and bespoke furniture, shattering plaster BMX wheels, Ediacaran based décor, rocket stands and giant cocoons, and more. She has worked as a designer, production manager, builder, scenic artist, stage manager, sourcer and sorcerer for major companies, festivals and independent artists. She likes nothing better than working in great teams to produce beautiful experiences. She is currently Creative Associate at Patch Theatre and, with Geoff Cobham, has co-designed all of Patch’s shows since 2019. Maddog’s design credits include Adelaide Cabaret Festival 2018–2021, Dark Mofo 2018 & 2019, Adelaide Festival 2013–2016, Darwin Festival 2010– 2015, Adelaide Fringe 2007–2009, Ubud Writers & Readers Festival 2012, Red Sky Morning – State Theatre Company of South Australia (2016), and co-design with Meg Wilson on Life is Short and Long – Emma Beech and Vitalstatistix (2016).

Cedric Varcoe is a proud Ramindjeri and Narungga man from Raukkan and Point Pearce communities – an artist, weaver, carver, and respected cultural leader, keeping his culture strong. He has been painting since he was a boy of eight years old, inspired by watching his mother, sisters, brothers, aunts, and uncles as they created their artworks.

His main subjects are Ngarrindjeri Ruwi and Narungga Country, stylised Ngarrindjeri and Narungga ancestors, and his NGA:TJI (totems) snakes and lizards. Growing up, Cedric spent time with his Elders, whom he respected – from them, he learnt about his culture, dreaming sites, and stories. They would tell him, “here you learn weaving, carving, and painting so you can keep your MI:WI (spirit) strong and powerful in knowledge”. As Cedric got older, he began painting and drawing from his childhood memories spent on Country by the ocean, River Lakes, and Coorong. He started creating artworks that share about his lands, waters, history, and stories passed on to him. His unique artistic style is full of colour and reflects his vision, connection and spirit that is strong in his Country.

Cedric's works are held in private and public collections around the world. His art is featured in a variety of products and public artworks, including murals in communities throughout South Australia.

Luku Kukuku is South Australia’s favourite multidisciplinary multimedia guru, well known for his specialities of Art, Design, Animation, Digital Media, Interactivity and Sound Responsive Multimedia. For over a decade, Luku has been using this varied palette of skills to forge an expanding and award winning career in the Australian art landscape.

The magic of imagination, the delight of creativity, and the thrill of light, colour, and motion constantly drive Luku to strive towards new forms of artistic expression which fully capture the revolutionary tools at our disposal at this wonderful point in history.

James Dodd exhibits regularly across Australia in publicly funded institutions, commercial galleries and artist-run spaces.  He works with a range of approaches including particular interests in painting, machines as art, graffiti, adventure and public space. He maintains a curiosity in sheds, backyards suburbia and the creative activities and transgressions that occur in these spaces.

A recent and ongoing project is The Painting Mill; a contraption that is cobbled together from various household, shed-found and DIY parts such as cordless drills, rollerblades and bicycles, which are operated via remote control. The Painting Mill becomes somewhat performative in its presentation whilst also pursuing painted outcomes that can be engaging in their own right.

Dodd is active as an educator at Adelaide Central School of Art and regularly delivers youth and community based arts programs across a range of outcomes. He is often finding ways to tap into his kinetic art interests to develop educational projects that lean into both visual art and STEM streams.

Bianka is a designer + maker with a diverse practice, working across stage, screen and gallery.  Bianka has been Head of Prop Making for the multi award winning children’s TV series Beep and Mort, lectured in the creative industries division of Adelaide College of the Arts, is Co-Founder of Kinetik Collective and operates a workshop from fab, a new iteration of the acclaimed George Street Studios. 

Her debut solo exhibition Sugar won an Adelaide Fringe 2021 visual arts award and was an industry example of integrating accessibility into the design, fabrication and exhibition of an art experience. Her accessible theatre designs have also been recognised with a 2022 Ruby Award. Permanent public artworks can be found in Adelaide and in the Kangaroo Island Sculpture Trail.

Currently Bianka is working on the design of DreamBIG festival (2025), a range of furniture and objects and a variety of wonderful live performance works.

Wendy has done set and costume design for a variety of performing arts companies and has done everything else from site co-ordination to prop maker and scenic artist. Set and Costume Designer Credits include: Worldhood [Australian Dance Theatre], One [Tutti], Skip Miller [Brink Productions], The Little Green Tractor [Patch Theatre], Ruby Bruise [The Misery Children & Vitalstatistix], Harbinger [Brink Productions], Man Covets Bird [Slingsby], Superheroes [Stone/Castro Productions], The Hypochondriac [Brink Productions], Freaky [Cirkidz & Circus Monoxide], After The End [Adelaide Fringe 09], Beetle Graduation [Brink Productions), The Tragical Life of Cheeseboy [Slingsby 2007], and Three Men in a Tub [Fringe 2009]. Other roles have included Designer and builder of Travelling Street Theatre, Assistant Designer for the Persian Garden, [Adelaide Festival of Arts Nightclub 2008 & 2006]. Site Coordinator [WOMADelaide 07], Prop Maker & Scenic Artist [Moonlantern Parade 2007–2009, Fringe Parade 2009, Windmill Performing Arts, State Theatre Company of SA, Australian Dance Theatre and Performing Lines Wicked The Musical].

Wiradjuri artist Elisabeth Blomberg, under the name Wiinya, delves into the connection of country and soul through visual and textural creations, inspired by the land that surrounds us.

Coming from rural New South Wales, she watched as her nan and pop painted their Country, and created art with techniques that had been passed onto them. This has followed Elisabeth as she has taken these skills and found her own voice with her art. Be it painting, weaving, or discovering new mediums, Elisabeth produces work from a visceral place of wonder and unknown.

“It started as a way to connect back to myself and really find what brought me joy, but what I found was a way to connect to my culture and also express my creativity”

Alex is an Adelaide-based technician, working across lighting, sound, and av; specialising in technical/system design. Alex started tech at high school to try and skip class, but it ended up becoming something he fell in love with and eventually turned into a career. Since then, he has worked across theatre, film, live music and events for companies including Patch Theatre, Windmill Theatre Company, Australian Dance Theatre, Restless Dance Theatre, Gravity & Other Myths, Marvel Studios and more. He first worked with Patch during a high school work experience placement. He came in for a week of creative development on The Moon’s a Balloon and helped to build set and lighting elements of the show. After getting into the industry as an adult he found his way back to Patch and has become the System Designer, Touring Technician and Operator on most of Patch’s shows/productions.

Lizzy’s first ever theatre experience was seeing a Patch show when she was five. She is thrilled to be working with the company after her creative imagination was sparked by them all those years ago.

Lizzy is a performer who trained at UWS Theatre Nepean. She has many years experience working and collaborating across theatre, film, TV, radio and teaching. She was a founding member of Brink Productions (appearing in 12 shows and tours with the company). She has also been a regular at State Theatre Company South Australia (with 13 credits to her name). Lizzy has also worked with Bell Shakespeare, Queensland Theatre Co, Flying Penguin and nowyesnow amongst others.

Edgell Junior is a proud Ni-Vanuatu man (from Pentecost Island, Vanuatu). From 2011 until 2019, Edgell Junior was a core ensemble member of Vanuatu’s internationally renowned Wan Smolbag Theatre (WSB), who work year-round producing, performing, and touring plays, films, educational resources, and workshop. Alongside performing, Edgell also has extensive experience as a film and stage production crew member and assistant lighting designer.

Edgell has been based in Adelaide, SA since 2020 and undertaken various crew and site build positions for Bamboozled Productions, Gluttony, The Garden of Unearthly Delights, Tandanya National Aboriginal Cultural Institute, Adelaide Festival and FEAST Festival.

From 2021–2023 Edgell was a member of Slingsby’s Flying Squad – creating and touring workshops and new works The Memoryologist, This Tree is a Story and Light Creatures across SA venues, schools, and festivals and most notably ‘The River That Ran Uphill’ which premiered as part of the 2023 Adelaide Festival and was based on Edgell’s story of his experience and survival of cyclone Pam that devastated Vanuatu in 2015.

Most recently, Edgell has been working with Patch Theatre on delivering their Sea of Light installation and new in-school touring work Glow & Tell. Edgell looks he forward to finding new projects and artistic collaborators where he can share and build on his experience, and proudly share Pacific Islander stories, perspective, and culture.

Ezra graduated from AC arts in 2006. Since then has had the great pleasure performing all over Australia and around the world including London, Canada, USA and China. Ezra is a proud Australian Filipinx performer and one of the highlights of his career was writing and performing in Blood, Sweat & Karaoke a modern Australian story that focuses on cultural identity.

Other works you may have seen Ezra in include: The Wizard of Oz, Beep, Rumpelstiltskin, Grug and the Rainbow, Mr. Burns: A Post-Electric Play, That Eye, The Sky, Rip Cord, Hibernation, Chalk Face, Candide.

Temeka Lawlor is a highly skilled theatre maker and performer based in Adelaide. Since acquiring her Advanced Diploma of Acting from Adelaide College of the Arts in 2017, Temeka has created and performed in award-winning theatre productions, touring regionally and nationally.

Temeka co-created and starred in Patch Theatre’s ZOOOM and co-created Home – she has toured with the company internationally and nationally, performing both ZOOOM and Me & My Shadow.

 In 2018, she performed in the debut of Waxing Lyrical’s Hannah and toured regional Australia with Splash Theatre’s The Book Show. Temeka was part of the original making ensemble for The PaperBoats award-winning show Especially on Birthdays, directed by Dave Brown, and has performed the piece to regional communities in 2020 and 2021 and was awarded Best Children’s Show in the Adelaide Fringe in 2021.

In 2022, Temeka was appointed Associate Artistic Director of The PaperBoats and began the development of her own new show titled Precious Things, which will hold its debut season in 2023.

To compliment her interests in performing and physical theatre, Temeka also practices and teaches yoga.

Ksenja has long admired, and wanted to work with Patch Theatre. She feels qualified to attempt this as she finds herself in a daily ongoing self-devised piece involving two of her own children; and with a history of working across a range of Australian Theatre companies.

Her most recent mainstage production was The Dictionary of Lost Words which performed in Adelaide, Sydney, and Melbourne, for Sydney Theatre Company and State Theatre Company of South Australia.

Astrid is a performer/theatre maker and teacher who works predominantly on collaborative, new works. She has worked with most South Australian companies and many independent artists. She co-created and performed in Me & My Shadow, Emily Loves to Bounce, Mr McGee and the Biting Flea and performed in Sharon Keep Ya Hair On and Pigs, Bears, Billy Goats Gruff for Patch Theatre. For Ladykillers Astrid wrote and performed in the award winning Cake, The Pyjama Girl and Based on a True Story. She has also worked extensively with Restless Dance and Vitalstatistix. Astrid sang for the re-score of Fritz Lang’s Metropolis for Sydney Opera House, Mona Foma, AFF & Fed. Square. She runs workshops for arts organisations and schools. Astrid is currently working on an original solo work – WIDOW WEIRDO with long term collaborators Ingrid Voorendt and Zoë Barry.

Freja is a performer and visual artist. Born and raised in Denmark, she moved to Berlin in 2021 to study Acting at Cours Florent Berlin, where she is currently enrolled. 

She has worked on a wide range of art projects including festivals, art exhibitions, installation art, theatre and film.

Freja is the creator of FatCatzCollective, based in Berlin, creating live performance and music events for any artist who needs a stage. She is passionate about bringing artists and people from all corners of the world together in the creation of art and life.

Her skills and interests are primarily in physical theatre, illustration and acrylic painting, skateboarding and event organising.

Evyenia “Jennifer” Stefanidis is a multidisciplinary Greek-Australian artist working on Kaurna Country, South Australia. An alum of the Flinders University Drama Centre, she continued her collaborative, ensemble-based practice as a member of Slingsby’s Flying Squad.

In 2022, Jennifer undertook a directorial secondment with State Theatre Company South Australia on Antigone, for which she performed various offstage roles before stepping in as an understudy. Evyenia finalised her work with Slingsby Theatre in The River That Ran Uphill, as part of the 2023 Adelaide Festival and Slingsby’s By Request program, touring metropolitan, rural and regional South Australia.

She is enthusiastic to join Patch Theatre’s Spark program as a Glow & Tell creator and performer. Her recent credits include The River That Ran Uphill, This Tree is a Story (Slingsby Theatre), The Seagull (Dir. Connor Reidy) and Revolt. She Said. Revolt Again. (Dir. Anthony Nicola).

Rachel is a graduate of Flinders University Drama Centre in South Australia. She has performed in The Dictionary of Lost Words (STCSA/STC), Macbeth, A Doll’s House, In the Club, Sense and Sensibility (STCSA Ensemble), Jasper Jones and Decameron 2.0 (STCSA), Angelique (isthisyours?), Cranky Bear, The Lighthouse (Patch), Limit, Red Sky Morning (STCSA Umbrella), Tartuffe (STCSA/Brink), The Wolves (RUMPUS), Speak Out (ActNow), Foolz (Flinders University) and This Storm (The Unrest Cure). Her puppeteer credits include the Australian and USA tours of Bluey’s Big Play (Windmill Theatre/HVK), Beep (Windmill Theatre) and on screen in Beep and Mort (Windmill Pictures). She directed Di and Viv and Rose (RUMPUS), worked as assistant director on Girls and Boys (STCSA), As One (Tiny Bricks) and Love and Information (Flinders Drama Centre) and was an Intimacy Consultant on Requiem (Adelaide Festival).

Since the 1970’s Briony has lived and loved the theatre life, predominantly in Adelaide. She has been very fortunate to tour extensively throughout Australia and overseas with such companies as The Compaigne Philippe Genty, Meryl Tankards Australian Dance Theatre, Bell Shakespeare Co and most recently with the Australian Dance Theatre. Briony is thrilled to be touring around America and Canada in 2023 with the wonderful production “ZOOOM”.

Ayden Martin is a Narungga and Arrernte man from South Australia, Kaurna country, Adelaide. He works in the performing arts industry as a live production technician and part-time cultural performer with the Yellaka dance group.

Ayden, an Adelaide College of the Arts graduate, has advanced skills in live theatre and music. He has worked for large institutions, arts organisations, local government councils, art & music festivals, and emerging & established artists. These organisations include Tandanya (National Aboriginal Cultural Institute), Balya Production, Mosaic Audio Visual, Yelleka, The Centre for Projection Arts, and many more.

Grateful for recently joining the Patch Theatre team, Ayden hopes to learn more from industry professionals, performers, and technicians.