Stuart Shugg is an Australian dancer and choreographer who graduated from the Victorian College of the Arts, Melbourne, in 2008. In Australia, he worked extensively with Russell Dumas’s Dance Exchange and Linda Sastradipradja. He has also appeared in the works of Lucy Guerin, Philip Adams, and Antony Hamilton. From 2011 to 2020, Shugg lived and worked in New York, dancing with Jon Kinzel, Jodi Melnick, Jo McKendry, and as a member of the Trisha Brown Dance Company. He’s been described in the New York Times as a “lucid dancer with scrupulous technique”, and a “dancer of uncommon grace”. His own work has been shown in NYC at Movement Research, Center for Performance Research, Gibney Dance Center, Roulette, Chez Bushwick, Cathy Weis' Sundays on Broadway, and Brooklyn Studios for Dance. Shugg received his MFA in Dance at Bennington College, Vermont, in Spring 2018. He currently lives in Dunoon, New South Wales, Australia.

See Stuart’s website at stuartshugg.com and follow him on Instagram @stuartshugg

EXCHANGE #3
In conversation with Stuart Shugg (Dunoon, New South Wales, Australia)
Recorded on March 15, 2021

This is an edited version of Joanna and Stuart’s hour and a half conversation and includes topics such as: the push and pull with our identity as dancers, the legacy/lineage of Trisha Brown, and a perspective on the Black Lives Matter movement in the US from Australia.

*To turn closed captioning on or off, click on the CC icon in the bottom right corner of the video.

Below is the raw movement exchange relayed from Liyabuya to Stuart. You will see Liyabuya doing her original movement and then you will see both of them doing Liyabuya’s movement, which Stuart learned. Stuart will add onto this and that movement will be passed onto Alain Sinandja in Kobe, Japan.

Below is the raw movement exchange relayed from Stuart to Alain. You will see Stuart doing his original movement and then you will see both of them doing Stuart’s movement, which Alain learned. Alain will add onto this and that movement will be passed onto Björn Säfsten in Stockholm, Sweden.

Photos by Jamie Green; Instagram @jamie_.green

This project is commissioned in part by the American Dance Festival (ADF).

Logo design by Chris Cherry