HARRIET GILLIES Award-winning and working across a range of performance modes, Harriet has presented works in Australia, New Zealand, Asia and North America. She’s been supported by arts organisations and government agencies at regional, national and international levels.

She worked with Robert Wilson at the Watermill Centre and Marina Abramović at Kaldor Public Art Projects. Residencies include La Serre: Arts Vivants in Montreal, the Bearded Tit in Sydney, the Cad Factory in Narrandera. Harriet was a recipient of the Glorias’ Fellowship for professional development across North America with mentor Lynsey Peisinger. 

Her solo performance, ‘The Power of the Holy Spirit’, won Best Experimental Award at Melbourne Fringe Festival. Her digital performance, ‘Pleasuredome’ premiered at Griffin Lock-In, commissioned by Griffin Theatre Company and Google Creative Labs, with an encore season at the 2021 Sydney Festival. She currently tours Queer PowerPoint, an innovative spin on the PowerPoint presentation that has become a cult classic, presented at Sydney Opera House, RISING Festival, MCA Sydney, Biennale of Sydney, Darwin Festival, Now or Never Festival, Western Australian Museum, Sydney World Pride, Princess Theatre Brisbane, Federation Square Melbourne, Grey Space (Taiwan), AGNSW, the Factory Theatre and Horizon Festival.

In 2024 she premiered 8/8/8:REST, the second instalment of the multi-award-winning triptych 8/8/8, commissioned by RISING Festival. This 8-hour performance took over the Arts Centre Melbourne between 9pm and 5am for three sold-out shows. 

Harriet performed in immersive and interactive projects such as Pony Express’ Ecosexual Bathhouse and Hermann Nitsch 150-Actions. She was a man-wrangler for Nat Randall and Anna Breckon’s ‘The Second Woman’ as well as co-production manager and tour manager for Peaches’ There’s Only One Peach With a Hole in the Middle for Kampnagel, which toured Europe in 2019. She has worked as a teaching artist for VCA and NIDA, and has been a panellist for VCR Fest, Carriageworks, Museum of Contemporary Art, and Vivid. She is currently the Artistic Co-Ordinator at the School of the Arts & Media at UNSW.

I live and work on the unceded Aboriginal land of the Gadigal and Bidjigal people.

I would like to pay my respects to elders past, present, and future, and extend that acknowledgement and respect to all first nations people who have found their way to this site. 

Always was, always will be, Aboriginal land.