Artistic Director

Katye Coe is a dance artist based in the UK. She has practiced as a performer, choreographer and teacher since 1994.  She is a senior lecturer in Dance at Coventry University www.coventry.ac.uk/cdare. Current projects include Groundswell and What_Now 2014 at Independent Dance;  ‘Way Pieces’, a choreographic commission at Slimbridge WWT through resident artist Alex Howard; ‘Where we are Not’ a research practice with Charlie Morrissey www.katyecoe.wordpress.com/. Katye performs for Joe Moran and Florence Peake. She teaches independently across the UK and internationally. Katye is the founding director of Decoda decoda-uk.christiankipp.com.

Project Team

Lily Hayward-Smith, Project Director, is an independent dance artist based in the West Midlands. She graduated from Coventry University with a Masters in Dance Making and Performance in September 2009. She is interested in body-work practices such as Body Mind Centering and Skinner Releasing Technique and her performance work builds from improvisation and process led enquiry. Lily runs the monthly Ground Work sessions and manages Decoda’s interns. Lily is also currently working as a full time Research Administrator at C-DaRE Coventry University.

 

Angelika Mizińska, Intern

Jenna Hubbard is a West Midlands based dance artist with an interest in community practice and site-specific dance performance. Jenna is currently working as a Dance Lecturer at De Montfort University in Leicester and teaches parent and child creative dance classes in Kenilworth. She is a member of Spiltmilk Dance and is currently working on their ‘Spiltmilk say Dance’ tour. Jenna has been working with Decoda and the Summer Dancing festival since the beginning in 2008, where she worked as an intern. She now uses her skills in communication, marketing and project planning to support the development of the organisation. Jenna manages the graduate performances in the Summer Dancing Festival, Moving Out, supporting new and emerging dance artists to start their careers after university. Jenna manages all of the design and dissemination of marketing materials for the Decoda Moved series, Sound Moves project and the Summer Dancing Festival. Jenna has created performance work for the Summer Dancing festival, including Families Dancing 2012.

Hilary Kneale has a background in education, fine art installation and somatic practice. She is an Oxford-based independent artist. Her key areas of interest are body-based responses relating to natural site and object through presence and performance. She has worked in a rich mix of cross-art form collaborations both within natural and man-made environments and other specifically constructed installations. Her creative attention is currently focused on aspects of the natural landscape and in particular close study of the element of water. She currently works with this focus, in collaboration with photographer Christian Kipp. Over the last two years they have worked in wild places that have very specific relationships to water. The resulting work is emerging in layers of practice, conversations, images and text, which are slowly emerging into the world. The study of Native American earth based shamanic teachings, support this work and enhance her ability to respond intuitively within the environment. Hilary Kneale has recently published her second book, Silent Vessel, a book as artwork incorporating writings, poetry and photographic images recording a ten year project that culminated in a ten hour durational performance in the company of the ocean and a multitude of hand-built vessels.

Amy Voris is a dance-artist based in Manchester. Her practice is responsive and associative, driven by an interest in the body/psyche as a multitudinous entity and in developing relationships with people and with movement material over long stretches of time. The outcome of the work is contingent on hunches and interactions that occur during the process and varies widely. Examples of current projects include a collaboration with three North West based artists exploring female lineage (accumulations) and a long term site-responsive project (Enter Inhabit). Amy has on-going creative relationships with photographer Christian Kipp, composer James Buchanan, lighting designer Cath Cullinane, jewellery designer Zoe Robertson and with dance artists Natalie Garrett, Caroline Salem and Meghan Flanigan. She has worked in higher education since 1999 delivering a range of dance-related subjects at Laban, London Contemporary Dance School, Birkbeck College, Coventry University, Plymouth University, Manchester Metropolitan University and The Northern School of Contemporary Dance. She has an ongoing commitment to developing artist-led initiatives such as the choreographers’ circle in London, Decoda in Coventry and a sunday school in Manchester. With choreographer Ruth Segalis and performer Natasha Gilmore, Amy was a founding member of Rose’s Thoughts Dance Company (London, 1996-2003). In 2012, Amy completed training in Integrative Bodywork and Movement Therapy with Linda Hartley.
www.amyvoris.com

Laurel Jenkins Tentindo is an independent choreographer, dancer and teacher based in Los Angeles.  Laurel danced around the world as a member of the Trisha Brown Dance Company from 2007-2012. She developed original roles in Brown’s final three works. Additionally, Laurel has danced with Sara Rudner, Vicky Shick, and the Liz Lerman Dance Exchange. Her choreographic and dancing practices are deeply influenced by the Skinner Releasing Technique, Improvisation, and Trisha Brown’s movement vocabulary. Laurel’s work has been shown internationally and in NYC at Danspace, Judson Church, Joyce SoHo and at the Puppet Lab at St. Anne’s Warehouse, and in Los Angeles at Highways, The Fowler Museum, the Electric Lodge and Pieter. She is currently developing IMAGE ACTION in Los Angeles, a contemporary circus of dances with objects that engages the audience in the kinesthetic experience of the dance. She credits Decoda and the Figure Eight Collective for their support and artistic contributions to this work.

Charlie Morrissey is a director/choreographer, performer, teacher, and researcher who has been working in the UK and internationally for 25 years. 
He creates large and small-scale site-specific and theatre and gallery based performance work in diverse contexts and locations; teaches at festivals, for dance and theatre companies, and in educational establishments; organises and collaborates in a variety of improvisational and research projects; and performs in the work of other choreographers.His work is informed by significant working relationships with dance makers such as Steve Paxton, Lisa Nelson, Becky Edmunds, Scott Smith, Kirstie Simson, K.J.Holmes, Siobhan Davies, Gill Clarke and Katie Duck amongst many others.Current and recent work includes: directing a major large-scale site-specific work The Tree of Light performed by 1,000 people as part of the Cultural Olympiad in 2012; performed in Ordinary Courage choreographed by Theo Clinkard; working with Siobhan Davies on a new piece for the ICA, Tramway and Arnolfini for 2013/14; developing Plans of the Tenth Floor – a new mobile installation work with Marisa Zanotti; working as movement director on Running on Empty – a new work with Antonia Grove and her company Probe; working with Katye Coe on developing a new work Where we are not; working with Robert Clarke and his company on a new production The Happiness Project; teaching across the UK, mainland Europe and elsewhere.
www.charliemorrissey.com

 

Board Members

Amy Voris is a dance-artist based in Manchester. Her practice is responsive and associative, driven by an interest in the body/psyche as a multitudinous entity and in developing relationships with people and with movement material over long stretches of time. The outcome of the work is contingent on hunches and interactions that occur during the process and varies widely. Examples of current projects include a collaboration with three North West based artists exploring female lineage (accumulations), a laboratory between nine artists working in different media (L219) and a farcical yet extremely successful business venture (aMigaentErpriseS).  Amy has on-going creative relationships with photographer Christian Kipp, composer James Buchanan, lighting designer Cath Cullinane, jewellery designer Zoe Robertson and with dance artists Natalie Garrett, Caroline Salem and Meghan Flanigan.  She has worked in higher education since 1999 delivering a range of dance-related subjects at Laban, London Contemporary Dance School, Birkbeck College, Coventry University, Plymouth University, Manchester Metropolitan University and The Northern School of Contemporary Dance. She has an ongoing commitment to developing artist-led initiatives such as the choreographers’ circle in London, Decoda in Coventry and a sunday school in Manchester.
www.amyvoris.com

Jenna Hubbard is a dance artist with an interest in community practice and site-specific dance performance. Jenna is currently working as a Dance Lecturer at De Montfort University in Leicester and is also studying for a masters degree in Community Dance at the University of Roehampton. Jenna’s specialism is working with young children and their families, created Families Dancing (2012) with local familes for the Summer Dancing Festival.
As a performer, Jenna has worked extensively with Spiltmilk Dance, Rosemary Lee (Square Dances 2011) and has collaborated with Lily Hayward-Smith on a number of projects.
Jenna is a board member for Decoda and previously worked for Decoda as a Project Manager (2008-2013). As a project manager, Jenna developed the marketing and communication for Decoda and contributed to the Moving Out Graduate programmes and the Sound Moves project, as well as the day to day running of the organisation.

Laura Elliott is a cultural practitioner working as an artist, curator, project manager and developer of visual arts and contemporary heritage in the UK. She devises projects that connect people with place and that celebrate the peculiar and unconventional aspects of living in an old country. Laura often works in collaboration with other people and dreams of opening a museum one day. She is Director of Artspace, Coventry (www.coventry-artspace.co.uk) and co-curator of the City Arcadia programme (www.city-arcadia.co.uk).

David Bennett is currently working towards a PhD within the Centre for Dance Research (C-DaRE) at Coventry University. Previously he has worked on a number of archive-related digital projects, most notably the Siobhan Davies Dance Archive (www.siobhandaviesreplay.com).

In addition, David is a teacher, performer and choreographer working alongside similar independent artists on small-scale projects. Prior to embarking on a career in dance, David worked for a number of West Midlands-based manufacturing companies in administrative, planning and business analyst roles.
http://www.linkedin.com/in/dbennett121

Christian Kipp is a photographer based in Essex. He splits his time between working on his own in the landscape and collaborating with a variety of dance artists.

Polly Hudson is a teacher and artist with an international reputation. Polly makes performance and Screendance works. She has shown numerous live, film and installation pieces over a twenty year period nationally in the UK and internationally in the USA and Europe in theatres, galleries, site specifically and at festivals. Polly is a certified teacher of Skinner Releasing Technique, the principles of which underpin her approach to teaching, making and living. www.pollyhudson.com

Denise Horsely completed undergraduate training at London College of Dance gaining a BA (Hons) Dance, and was presented with the Madge Atkinson Cup, awarded for outstanding talent in choreography, upon graduating. After several years working as a freelance artist; teaching, performing and choreographing in community, educational and theatrical settings; she returned to postgraduate study with Laban/Siobhan Davies Dance/Independent Dance completing an MA Creative Practice. She was offered the opportunity, through Dance UK, to complete an internship with Kate Flatt and the Soul Play Project. She is an associate of the Imperial Society of Teachers of Dancing, qualified to teach Imperial Ballet and National, and has written articles for both Dance UK and Dance: The Magazine of the ISTD Dance Examinations Board. Denise has a lifelong passion for ballet, and a desire and commitment to promoting the accessibility of ballet to all who both desire it and invest in it through personal study and application. She facilitates and enables others to discover and progress ballet technique for themselves. She teaches on the degree course at Coventry University, and offers mixed-ability classes to adults from the Motionhouse studio in Leamington Spa.