Henry Chan

In response to this year’s Festival theme, Fight | Flight, how do we continue to work and create in these troubling times?

Join us for a robust conversation and panel about sustainability within national and international arts-working structures. International arts workers share their contexts with us, detailing the challenges and successes of working across borders and between diverse cultures.

This session will be moderated by Geir Lindhal, International Project Manager at CPH Stage in Copenhagen, with panelists:

• Joseph Lee, Artistic Director, Unlock Dancing Plaza (Hong Kong)
• Gritt Uldall-Jessen, Artistic Director/Co-Founder, Det Frie Felts Festival (Denmark)

*additional panelists will be added in the coming days.

Geir Lindahl is an International Project Manager at CPH STAGE, a performing arts festival in Copenhagen, Denmark. He has over 10 years of experience in cultural policy, public funding, and international collaboration. Previously, he served as a Senior Advisor at Nordic Culture Point in Helsinki and as an Advisor at Performing Arts Hub Norway (PAHN). With strong expertise in project management, diplomacy, and administration, Geir has worked closely with ministries, embassies, and cultural institutions across the Nordic region and internationally.

Joseph Lee is a choreographer, performer, and performance curator based in Hong Kong. Since 2022, he has served as the Artistic Director of Unlock Dancing Plaza. He is also the guest co-curator for Performance Co-Lab, an initiative by Tai Kwun (2024–2026). As a creator, his practice spans live performance, moving image, writing, and curatorial work. His creations frequently explore themes of popular culture, queer corporeality, bodily labour, and the continuities and ruptures between dance and its representation. Lee’s curatorial work explores overlooked areas of local contemporary dance culture—including knowledge production in creative processes, cross-cultural and cross-medium dialogues, and community-based physical creativity. His initiatives include the residency-based dance festival #DANCELESS complex, the local research and development program Unlock Body Lab: Open Research Week. Through these platforms, he broadens perspectives on the body as a creative medium. His live performances and video works have been presented in the United Kingdom, Germany, Japan, Australia, South Korea, Shanghai, and Beijing. He was awarded the Award for Young Artist by the Hong Kong Arts Development Council in 2017.

Gritt Uldall-Jessen is the Artistic Director (since 2023) and one of the Co-Founders of Det Frie Felts Festival (established in 2013). Formerly a spokesperson and co-founder of the interest organization Uafhængige Scenekunstnere (Independent Performing Artists), Gritt works as a writing performing artist in the independent field of stage art and as a curator within performing arts. He was educated as a playwright at Dramatikeruddannelsen (The National School of Playwriting) in Aarhus, Denmark, and holds a Master’s degree in Danish from the University of Copenhagen and a Diploma in Cultural Management from Københavns Professionshøjskole (University College Copenhagen (KP)).