Australian choreographer Melanie Lane has been appointed Artistic Director and Co-CEO of Lucy Guerin Inc (LGI), beginning in January 2027.
Lane will succeed founder Lucy Guerin AO, who will step down as Artistic Director and CEO at the end of 2026 after 25 years leading the Melbourne-based contemporary dance company. LGI has also announced that it will adopt a new name, to be revealed following Guerin’s departure.
Lane is an Australian choreographer and performer whose work spans contemporary dance, theatre, opera, visual arts and music. Her independent works have been presented in Australia and internationally, while she has received commissions from organisations including Sydney Dance Company, Chunky Move, Australasian Dance Collective, Dance North, West Australian Ballet and several European companies.
Her theatre and opera credits include Salome for English National Opera in London, Trojan Women and Nosferatu for Vienna’s Burgtheater, and Die Orestie for Schauspiel Köln, directed by Australian theatre maker Adena Jacobs.
Her practice draws on her European and Indonesian heritage and has included ongoing work in Indonesia as a choreographer, performer, collaborator and mentor. In 2018 she received the Keir Choreographic Award, having previously won the Leipziger Bewegungskunstpreis in Germany in 2017.
Lane has maintained a connection with Lucy Guerin Inc, having been a resident director there in 2015. She is currently Chair of the Board at Dancehouse in Melbourne and has held residencies and artistic positions with organisations including Chunky Move, The Substation and QL2 Canberra. She was a Creative Australia Fellow in 2023–24 and a Sidney Myer Fellow in 2024–25.
Lane said she was honoured to take on the role and acknowledged Guerin’s contribution to the company and the artists it has supported over its 25-year history.
“I feel privileged to build on this enduring home for dance,” Lane said, adding that she looked forward to working with the company’s staff, Board and artists on its future program.
Guerin said she had long admired Lane’s work and welcomed her appointment, describing her as an artist with an “inventive and distinct choreographic voice”.
Founded in Melbourne in 2002, Lucy Guerin Inc has produced and toured contemporary dance works in Australia and internationally. Its repertoire has been presented at venues and festivals including the Venice Biennale of Dance, Théâtre de la Ville in Paris, ImPulsTanz in Vienna, Brooklyn Academy of Music and the Shanghai International Arts Festival.
Under Guerin’s leadership, the organisation has expanded from a company centred on one choreographer’s practice to an organisation supporting and developing a broader community of dance artists.
Lane will take up the Artistic Director and Co-CEO role in January 2027, marking the beginning of the company’s next phase following Guerin’s departure.
Visit: lucyguerininc.com
