Turning 60 in style: Australian Dance Theatre leaps from the stage to the gallery wall

AD Daniel Riley describes the birth of ADT and an accompanying exhibition documenting the company’s six decades of dance-making.
Sebastian Geilings, Yilin Kong and Patrick O'Luanaigh from ADT's 'A Quiet Language'.

“It’s extraordinary that a dance company – a contemporary dance company – has reached the age of 60 in this country,” says Daniel Riley, a Wiradjuri man and Artistic Director of Australian Dance Theatre (ADT).

“I think it’s an extraordinary testament to the form – and that form being the oldest storytelling tool that we have. There is so much to say with the body, and hence the title of A Quiet Language [ADT’s 60th anniversary production]; we can say so much without actually saying anything at all.”

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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