TREMOR2 BY HELENE MARKSTEIN
In partnership with the Sydney Opera House and their Create Space Artist Residency Program, Critical Path is supporting performance maker, designer-scenographer Dr Helene Markstein. During her August 2025 residency, Markstein is developing her work TREMOR2 in collaboration with artists Anca Frankenhaeuser, Me-Lee Hay and William R. Bullock.
TREMOR2 follows Tremor, which Markstein created as part of Critical Path’s Regional Action Research Project 2023, when she took queues from her personal experience with Parkinson’s disease to translate movements into dance scores and vocabularies.
You can read an interview with Markstein reflecting on the earlier stage of her project Tremor by Ira Ferris from 2023: HERE
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ABOUT HELENE MARKSTEIN
Helene was a finalist at World Stage Design (WSD) 2017 Taipei, Taiwan. In 2018 at Ggantija Heritage site in Gozo Malta – ‘PAX – The Puzzle that is Peace’ Performance and Installation for 44 days, also in SAN LAWRENZ and Marsalforn. ‘Heaven on Earth’ (conceived as a sound poem) received a joint ‘win’ in the GOZO LIVE Play Writing Competition 2017. Helene spent 10 years as a designer in fashion. Directed community performances in the Blue Mountains and Malta combining social comment, movement and installation. Has written books, plays, chapters, reviews and academic papers on scenography, costume and choreography.
ABOUT ANCA FRANKENHAEUSER
Anca performed, taught and choreographed with London Contemporary Dance Theatre for fifteen years touring throughout UK and internationally. In Australia since 1990 she has taught extensively in dance schools, colleges and tertiary institutions, as well as co-creating and performing independent work with likeminded dancers, actors, singers, musicians and visual artists, including eleven productions with eminent sculptor Ken Unsworth. She presently works as a deviser/director/choreographer/performer, as well as lecturer/tutor of choreography and movement for actors.
ABOUT ME-LEE HAY
Me-Lee Hay is an award-winning composer for film, television, dance, and theatre. A Malaysian-born Chinese migrant to Australia, her work has appeared on Netflix, SBS One, Amazon Prime, and PBS, earning an AACTA nomination for Best Original Score in 2024 and a Sydney Theatre Award nomination for Best Composition and Sound Design. With a background in contemporary dance and classical ballet, Hay brings unique insight to movement-based compositions. Recent work includes “GOLD,” a critically acclaimed children’s ballet, and collaborations with Sydney Dance Company’s PPY, STC and Monkey Baa Theatre. Internationally, she composed for “Things Hidden Since the Foundation of the World,” touring the UK and US with Manchester’s Javaad Alipoor Theatre Company. As an Associate Composer with the Australian Music Centre, she blends classical textures with contemporary soundscapes.
ABOUT WILLIAM R. BULLOCK
William R. Bullock was born in Sydney, Australia in 1955 and has been using cameras, tape-recorders and other sonic devices since his teens. The thrust of his current work is creating experiential altered states with audio-visual environments, based on an abstract language in filmic and photographic media. A deep interest in hypnosis and trance states, which incorporates the processes of healing and stress management, is an underlying guide in this process. The techniques involved lead to abstract ambient imagery using colour and sound in unique and emotive ways, exploring liminal experiences, those places between places, initiations into the not quite sensed. William has exhibited his works in the U.S.A, UK and Australia and is continually experimenting in both still and video environments, creating predominantly ambient works. William has a Bachelor of Visual Arts Honours degree (Photomedia) from Sydney College of the Arts.
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This project is proudly supported by Critical Path and the Sydney Opera House.
The 2023 Regional Action Research Project was supported by Create NSW.
Create Space is a new artist residency program inspired by the architecture of the Opera House itself. It provides a platform for artists and makers to test new ground, challenge conventions and expand the boundaries of possibility.
Critical Path respectfully acknowledges the Gadigal and Birrabirragal people of the Eora Nation, the traditional owners of the land where the organisation is based.
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IMAGE ID: An image of an arm and hand against a black background. The wrist, thumb and fingers are folding in towards the forearm.
IMAGE CREDIT: TREMOR by Helene Markstein, image of Anca Frankenhaeuser, image by William R. Bullock.