Kris Nelson

Artistic Director/CEO at LIFT (London International Festival of Theatre)

Kris became Artistic Director and CEO of LIFT, London International Festival of Theatre in spring 2018. In just over a year, he's continued LIFT's bold vision; touring the dance work SESSION across the country, developing a new digital/mixed reality game led by young people in Tottenham and artist Imwen Eke, curating a mini-festival on diversity and inclusion for Virgin Group's top CEOs at Richard Branson's home in Oxfordshire, consolidating LIFT's first partnership with the Young Vic in a decade and laying the groundwork to create a brand new model of London's beloved international theatre festival.From 2013-2017, Kris was Festival Director of Dublin Fringe Festival, Ireland’s largest multi-disciplinary arts festival and one of the world’s only fully curated fringes. There he commissioned and presented hundreds of world premieres made for theatres, bridges, parks, spiegeltents and more and forged new international partnerships serving Irish artists with festivals in Europe and North America. In 2016, Dublin Fringe attracted its biggest audience turnout ever. Before this, Kris worked extensively in multi-disciplinary arts across Canada, where he founded the performing arts touring agency Antonym in Montreal, curated the Encounters Series for Magnetic North Theatre Festival in Ottawa, created the PushOFF series in Vancouver and worked on a number of initiatives dedicated to artist mobility, dramaturgy and unusual artistic practices.TwitterLinkedIn