Filling big shoes: replacing a founding Artistic Director

How do you replace someone whose personality, artistry and aesthetic sensibility have come to define a company’s creative output to date?
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Image: Force Majeure’s Not in a Million Years. Photo: Heidrun Löhr.

Kate Champion’s recent announcement that she would be stepping down as Artistic Director of Force Majeure (the acclaimed dance/theatre company she founded in 2002) in the new year, may have caught some in the industry by surprise, but no doubt also has many polishing their CVs in anticipation of stepping into the position.

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Richard Watts OAM is ArtsHub's National Performing Arts Editor; he also presents the weekly program SmartArts on Three Triple R FM. Richard is a life member of the Melbourne Queer Film Festival, a Melbourne Fringe Festival Living Legend, and was awarded the Sidney Myer Performing Arts Awards' Facilitator's Prize in 2020. In 2021 he received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Green Room Awards Association. Most recently, Richard received a Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM) in June 2024. Follow him on Twitter: @richardthewatts