Over the past 25 years, Guerin has built one of the most important and best-resourced contemporary dance companies in the country.

Guerin formed Lucy Guerin Inc (LGI) in 2002, after more than a decade working as an independent choreographer in New York City and Melbourne. The company received multi-year funding from the Australia Council in 2006 and produced in quick succession a series of critically acclaimed evening-length works, including Melt (2002), Aether (2005) and the multi-award-winning Structure and Sadness (2006).

These works were notable for theatricality as much as for pure movement invention. Guerin’s gifts as a director came increasingly to the fore as the scale of her projects grew.

Lucy Guerin. Photo © Amber Haines

Through LGI, she became one of the key figures in the dramaturgical turn in Australian contemporary dance, culminating in co-presentations with major theatre companies, including Malthouse Theatre on Human Interest Story (2010) and Belvoir on Conversation Piece (2012), bringing dance to an expanded audience.

These works opened fresh conversations around spoken text in dance, portable technology, the choreographic use of iPhones and iPods and the involvement of non-dancers.

Untrained (2009) paired two trained dancers with two untrained men...