Gaby Allard

Former Director ArtEZ Academy of Theatre & Dance.

Gaby Allard has been the director of the Academy of Theatre and Dance, ArtEZ from 2006 until September 1st 2019. Allard trained as a classical dancer at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague. Upon graduation she worked for fifteen seasons with the modern dance company Dance Works Rotterdam, first as a dancer, later assistant artistic director and in various other functions.

After her dance career, she worked for three years as coordinator of the Masters of Art programme in choreography at Codarts Rotterdam. Allard was appointed Director of the ArtEZ School of Dance in 2006, Faculty Director in 2009 and Academy director Theatre ánd Dance in 2015. Allard has sat on many boards and national advisory commissions and has been chairman of the national network of dance academy directors since 2010.

In addition, Allard has spent the past years conducting research on dance, both in the professional field and in dance education. She is principal investigator for the research project Move(me) ment!, the development of periodization in dance education in collaboration with professor Matthew Wyon, Wolverhampton University, United Kingdom. She conducted research on (urban) dance, performativity and public space as part of the research group of the lectureship Theory in the Arts, ArtEZ and has spent the last 3,5 year researching the concept of circular valorization in collaboration with philosopher Henk Oosterling. As of februari 2019 she is PhD student at Christ Church University England under supervision of Dr. Angela Pickard. Allard is founder and director of the National Centre of Performing Arts, the Netherlands. In 2002 she was awarded the prize of merit by the Dansersfonds ’79 Foundation for her versatile contribution to dance. She has been nominated for the Dance Educator Award 2019 by IADMS (International Association for Dance Medicine & Science). As of 1 September 2019, Allard has been installed as member of the executive board of ROC-Amsterdam Flevoland. She will be in charge of educational development and innovation, including the research portfolio. In this role she will emphasize the dissemination and validation of (her) practice based research in the Arts