Tru, (Ngāti Hine, Ngāti Te Tarawa, Ngāti Kahu o Torongāre) is a choreographer, curator, and poet working across performance and writing
disciplines. She is a graduate of the New Zealand School of Dance, and former company member of
Mau Dance.
Tru’s international career has taken her to festivals and residencies across Malaysia,
Japan, Tahiti, New Caledonia, Australia, America, Italy, Belgium, Holland, France, England, Germany,
and Austria. Recent independent choreographies and acclaimed productions include The glØaming
(Tempo Dance Festival, 2019), 5th Body xorcsm (Experimental Dance Week Aotearoa, 2019), 5th Body
(Votive Poetics Workshop, 2018), BlackOut (Kenneth Myers Centre, 2018), KARE; (Undiscliplining
Dance Symposium, 2016) and HINE-2012 (Maidment Theatre, 2012).
Tru has a PhD in artistic research from the University of Auckland, where she has also taught in
English and Drama, and Comparative Literature. Her writing interests include Aotearoan
performance philosophy, performance writing, speculative texts, and translingual experimental
poetry. She has contributed to a range of books, journals, chapbooks and online platforms, including
Blackmail Press, Poetry New Zealand, Tātai Whetū, Best New Zealand Poems 2017, Performance
Research, Undisciplining Dance, Te Ao Live, The Routledge Companion to Performance Philosophy,
and Te Rito o te Harakeke in support of Ihumātao (rangatahiotepene.com). Guest readings include
the Parnell Rose Festival, Aotea Square Opening Festival, Michael King Writers Centre, Kupu Rere,
Poetry Live, National Māori Writer’s Hui, White Nights festival, and numerous arts events. Tru no
longer presents her poetry as live readings, but encourages others to give voice/s to these works if
desired.
Her MKWC residency, our second for the year, will be spent researching the mysterious realm of black holes, which she
considers a cosmic mine of artistic, scientific, and conceptual potency. Tru intends to harness the
inspiration from this research toward a text of exploratory poetry provisionally titled, Lilithx starshredder.