Breaking

Counterpilot is an award-winning collective of interdisciplinary artists based in Brisbane, Australia. We create interactive performance works – activating audiences with new technology, rich design, and transmedia storytelling. Counterpilot seeks to transform the familiar, juxtaposing rich fictional worlds against a backdrop of the everyday. By subverting real social circumstances, we co-opt our participants as authentic performers.

We harness what we believe to be the most exciting thing about theatre – the live audience. Our works enable participants to observe themselves responding in real ways to hyper-real situations. We seek to provoke change through acts of trouble, mischief, and low-key chaos. We play in the space between people, and we poke at the tensions that bind us.

Director & Co-Writer

Nathan Sibthorpe is a contemporary performance-maker and video designer based in Brisbane, Australia. Nathan has been nominated for ten Matilda Awards, receiving the award for Best AV Design for Blue Bones in 2017. In the same year, he was also the recipient of the Dr Don Batchelor Award for Drama Research at QUT. In 2022, Nathan received a Sydney Theatre Award for Best Production for Young People, with I’ve Been Meaning to Ask You. He is best known as the director of Counterpilot, and teaches performance studies at QUT, where he holds a Masters Degree in contemporary performance.

Co-Writer

Maxine Mellor is an award-winning playwright and teaching artist, drawn to magical realism and black comedy. She won the Lord Mayor’s Young and Emerging Artist Fellowship [2017], The Max Afford Award [2014], the Queensland Premier’s Drama Award [2012], the Edward Albee New York City Residency [2012], a Matilda Award for Best New Work for Performance [2005], and Queensland Theatre’s Young Playwright’s Award [2001, 2002, 2003, 2004]. Productions include Horizon [Playlab, 2021], The Wind in the Willows [La Boite, 2015], Trollop [Queensland Theatre, 2013].

Sound Designer & Composer

Mike Willmett is a sound designer, composer and key creative for dance and theatre productions. His practice frequently revolves around the relationship between sound and space, with a particular focus on how sound can be manipulated to invite, distort and transport the perspective of an audience in immersive, lush environments.

Mike holds a Graduate Certificate in Academic Practice, Master of Music, and Bachelor of Creative Industries (Visual Art). He received a QUT Vice-Chancellor’s Award in 2017 for excellence in exceptional sustained performance and outstanding achievement in learning and teaching; innovative and creative practice; and influence on work culture or climate.

Video Systems Designer

Freddy Komp works in theatre and event production and multi-disciplinary forays across AV, Set, and Lighting Design (nominated for 2 Groundling and 2 Matilda Awards) and in AV Visual Arts Installations (including Living Rocks: A Fragment of the Universe at Venice Biennale 2019 and ZKM Karlsruhe 2022).

He loves a good challenge that demands a variety of skills and creative problem solving, and led production at Adelaide Film Festival (2015-2018) before returning to Queensland. Freddy has worked with accomplished directors including Bridget Boyle, Margi Brown-Ash, Shaun Charles, Daniel Evans, David Fenton, Michael Futcher, Nasim Khosravi, Benjamin Knapton, and Garry Stewart.

Video Designer & Stage Manager

Jeremy Gordon is a stage manager, technician and performance maker who holds a Bachelor of Arts in Contemporary and Applied Theatre and a Certificate II in Information Technology.

As well as being a regular collaborator with Brisbane based theatre companies The Good Room, Counterpilot and indelibilityarts, Jeremy has toured shows to every state and territory in Australia as a Freelance Stage Manager since 2014. In 2022, for his work over the previous two years, he received the QUT Creative Industries Backstage Award at the Matilda Awards.

Associate Creative

Christine Felmingham is a Brisbane based lighting designer who works in Theatre, Dance and Live Performance. In 2019 Christine was presented with the inaugural Emerging Female Leader Award at the Matilda Awards Ceremony.

As part of the core Counterpilot team she works as both a lighting designer and production/ technical manager. She is equally comfortable in technical roles, having worked as a touring production manager, board operator and lighting technician, and holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts (Technical Production) and a Bachelor of Fine Arts (Drama) at the same institution.

Associate Creative

Sarah Winter is a designer, performance-maker and installation artist. She creates immersive environments and experiences for events, festivals and theatre. Her practice focuses on memory and the audience experience in immersive installations and the creation of participatory environments, creating rich and detailed worlds for local, national and international audiences.

Her skills as an immersive site designer have been utilized for Brisbane Festival, Bleach Festival, Bleach Children’s Festival, Wonderland Festival and Brisbane Comedy Festival. Sarah has a practice-led PhD in Performance Studies investigating participatory installation environments. She currently teaches prototyping, creative placemaking and collaborative practice at QUT alongside her creative practice.