Artistic Director

Ellie is a disabled performance maker and artist living in Leeds and working internationally. She is artistic director of Polite Rebellion and the acclaimed Grief Series, a sequence of seven arts projects that open up spaces to talk about bereavement and end of life. She creates a range of solo and collaborative devised performance and installation work for studios, galleries, found and public spaces. Participation is at the heart of all of her work as a performer, facilitator and mentor. Ellie specialises in embedding care and ethical participation both in her own practice and offering consultancy to other artists and organisations. Her work is often characterised by a playful and provocative approach to difficult topics, encouraging audiences to make decisions and participate.
Ellie lectures on her practice, writing articles, giving talks, performances and workshops at universities internationally including University of the arts London, Sorbonne Paris, UAM Mexico City.

She graduated from Bretton Hall with a first class Degree in Acting in 2006 and an MA in Performance with Distinction from Leeds Beckett University in 2011.

​After graduating Ellie was on the Artistic Direction team for Pointed Arrow, making a range of journey based public art projects. Her first solo show Dressing The Part toured nationally and was developed into a durational performance in collaboration with Ollie Smith and supported by Greenroom Manchester and Light Night Leeds.

​In 2015 Ellie won A Love Arts award for her work on The Grief Series. Working on Grief Series has seen Ellie travel to Prague, Paris, Mexico City, Sibiu Festival and Timisoara Romania. The Projects in The Grief Series have gained national press attention. She has been invited to speak on Radio 4's Women’s Hour and has been included in Lynn Gardner’s theatre pick of the year.

Ellie is supported in her role by a team of Access Assistants.