MEET THIS YEAR'S DEBUT CHOREOGRAPHERS - Northern School of Contemporary Dance Northern School of Contemporary Dance

Antonio Bukhar Ssebuuma

Antonio is an award-winning performer, dance choreographer, and teacher from Uganda. His artistic practice draws on a blend of styles, namely Hip-hop, dancehall, breaking, afro-fusion, contemporary, house and indigenous Ugandan dances.

Antonio leveraged peer-to-peer learning in informal local communities of dance practice in Uganda to develop his skillset and knowledge base. This background enriches his pedagogy with a community-arts approach.

Antonio was awarded the Pina Bausch Fellowship in 2017 as a visiting dance scholar at the University of Auckland. He also received the Caroline Plummer Community Dance Fellowship at the University of Otago in 2019. Antonio’s artistic philosophy seeks to bridge the gap between street-based community arts practice and academia.

With over 15 years of dance experience, Antonio has worked in diverse cultural, artistic, and social contexts. These include disadvantaged communities in slums, orphanages and refugee centres; theatres, festivals, and schools in Uganda, Europe, and New Zealand. Antonio has worked with high-level academic institutions such as The University of Auckland, The University of Otago, Makerere University, Codarts Dance Center, Pacifika Institute of Performing Arts and the Norwegian College of Dance.

Hannah Bateman

Hannah was born in Surrey and started dancing at her local dance school when she was 3. Her training advanced when she joined the Central School of Ballet aged 16. She received her first professional contract at age 19, working for The Israel Ballet, dancing in works by Cranko, Balanchine, Krzysztof Pastor, and as a member of the Corps de Ballet in Sleeping Beauty and Coppelia.

In 2002, she joined Northern Ballet under the directorship of David Nixon and the training of Yoko Ichino and worked her way up the ranks to Principal Soloist. Whilst at Northern Ballet, she danced in all current repertoire including creating roles such as Jordan Baker in The Great Gatsby, Jane in the Southbank SkyArts Award-nominated ballet Jane Eyre by Cathy Marston, and roles in multi-award nominated works by Kenneth Tindall including Henriette in Casanova and Geisha Mother in Geisha.

Hannah toured across the world with Northern Ballet, performing in the opening night at the Beijing Opera House (National Centre for the Performing Arts) as Juliet in Romeo and Juliet, she performed in the Kenneth McMillian celebrations at the Royal Opera House in Gloria and performed soloist and principal roles in works by Nixon, Marston, Morricome, Tindall, Watkins and Hampson. She received much critical acclaim throughout her career, notably for her performance as Ondine in Ondine, and as the Lead couple in Hans Van Manen’s Concertante. She performed in the Production Prize-winning Project 1 at the International Choreographic Competition in Hanover, and has performed at MOMO Paris, Tate St Ives and Frieze Art Fair in work collaborated and curated by Linder Sterling, Kenneth Tindall, Pam Hogg, Christopher Shannon and Richard Nicol.

Hannah officially retired from the stage in 2021 with her final performances as Madam de Pompadour in Casanova.

Bruce Wong

Prior to joining the staff team at NSCD, Bruce worked with City Contemporary Dance Company (CCDC) in Hong Kong for 22 years, as a dancer, choreographer and rehearsal director. Alongside dancing in numerous works with the CCDC, Bruce also presented his own choreographic work with the company, including Dress Me Down in Strip Teaser 2012, Re/dis-connect in It’s My Turn 2013, How to become… in Eureka 2015, Why not kill us all? 2017, Rainbow House (dance video) 2020 and Listen Carefully in Days are Numbered 2021.

In 2022, Bruce worked as a movement coach for Cantonese chamber opera KungFood. Bruce has also worked as a choreographer for Wild the Musical for the City Chamber Orchestra of Hong Kong.