Anna McGrath is an interdisciplinary artist working across cinema and theatre.

She creates evocative stories, pushes the boundaries of form and deploys a playful curiosity to provoke necessary conversations.

Merging skills and experience in stage and screen, she creates work for traditional and non-traditional spaces; combining new technologies, live and pre-recorded materials and connects spectators via shared physical and digital worlds.

She works in Europe and Australia collaborating with artists across disciplines and focusses attention on the diverse expressions of human relations and universal emotion.

Anna’s practice-based research centres on ‘chasing dialogue’ - her unique devising and performance methodology.

Her films have screened at over 70 festivals worldwide and won numerous awards including at Tribeca Film Festival and Palm Springs ShortFest . She’s been nominated for Best Achievement in Direction at the Australian Directors Guild, selected as a Locarno Film Festival Leopard of Tomorrow and for the Berlinale Talent Campus, chosen as a Jury Member for the 2013 AACTA Awards and participant in Melbourne International Film Festival's Accelerator program.

For stage, Anna has directed Noël Coward's Private Lives in collaboration with Actors Centre Australia (Sydney), When Words Don’t Work (devised) in collaboration with the Aboriginal Centre for Performing Arts (Brisbane) and David Hare's The Blue Room in collaboration with the National Theatre Drama School (Melbourne). She was the Assistant Director for Constantine Costi for the world premiere of Laura Lethlean's The Space Between the Fuel and the Fire. And directed Neil Simon's Plaza Suite - The Visitor from Mamaroneck for her NIDA graduating production in 2016.

In 2017 Anna collaborated with co-curators and designers Alexander Berlage and Jeremy Allen on Narnia - a contemporary performing space at Gaytimes Festival. She assisted director Bridget Baloudis in the development workshop of Rachel Perk's work Moral Panic and worked as Assistant Director for Judy Davis on the NIDA production of Dennis Kelly's Love and Money.

2017 directing projects included the Australian premiere of Dana Lynn Formby's American Beauty Shop at KXT - Kings Cross Theatre and VICE | VERSA a site-specific devised work for Sydney Fringe 2017 with co-collaborators - Kate Rutherford, Elia Bosshard, Kyle Jonsson, Benjamin Freeman, Alexander Berlage, Matteo Romano-Bernardini and Oleg Pupovac. 

In 2018 Anna directed John Patrick Shanley's Women of Manhattan, a staged read for KXTeethcutting at Kings Cross Theatre, Sydney Australia.

Anna and her partner, Matteo Romano Bernardini, were artists-in-residence at the Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris, France as Laureates of the Vivant Spectacle Commission from August 2018 - August 2019. During her residency Anna curated the group exhibition I’ve a feeling we’re not in Oz anymore… featuring the work of Australian and international artists. In November 2018 she directed the first staged-read of the French translation of Lachlan Philpott’s play M.Rock, translated by Gisèle Joly.

In late 2018 Anna and Matteo launched REVEILLE - producing multi-disciplinary projects collaborating with artists from around the world.

| épochè | was developed as part of REVEILLE’s residency at the Cité Internationale des Arts in collaboration with French video artist, sculptor and sound designer Baptiste Brossard, the French dance/performance group SUZANNE and actress Eve Gerbaudi. The site-specific work featured Anna’s unique devising and performance technique ‘chasing dialogue’ and had its world premiere in Paris, January 2019.

In August 2019 REVEILLE hosted Laboratoire du Dialogue at the Cité Internationale des Arts - an immersive exhibit of practice-based-research exploring the development of the ‘chasing dialogue’ methodology and its potential in future work.

In 2020, Anna created Proxemica – a consultancy offering bespoke direction for creatives and professionals communicating via tele-conferencing platforms.

In 2022 Anna was invited to the New Course residency at Arteles Creative Centre, Haukijärvi, Finland, was one of four artists-in-residence at High Tees, and in September-November was in residence with her screen-writer husband Matteo Romano Bernardini at La Richardière, Lhomme France.

In April 2023 Anna introduced her ‘chasing dialogue’ methodology to the academic world, leading a workshop for students of Dr. Michele Bambling’s class ‘The Photo Album’ at NYU, Abu Dhabi, a workshop she led again in September 2023 for the next cohort of students.

Anna holds a Masters in Fine Arts - Directing from the National Institute of Dramatic Art (NIDA), a Masters in Film Narrative from the School of Film & TV, Victorian College of the Arts and a Bachelor of Arts Hons. (Fine Arts & Literature) from The University of Melbourne.

 
To get in touch with Anna about past or future projects click here...