ARTIST BIO

Xin Hui Ong is an emerging independent contemporary dance artist/choreographer and dance teacher. She has a strong interest in the role of the arts in health and community.

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Interdisciplinary collaboration is the cornerstone of her creative practice. Since 2018, Xin has partnered with dancers, musicians, photographers, videographers, and installation artists, to produce works which span stage, film and gallery and site installation. Her first dance film, Kindred (2021), premiered in Vancouver, Canada, and has also been presented in Mercury Cinemas in Adelaide during Australian Dance Theatre’s Flow: Dance on screen series.

Born in Singapore, Xin has also lived in the UK, Israel and Australia. She originally moved to Australia to pursue medicine at the University of New South Wales in Sydney. Working as a doctor, she found that the health issues faced by patients were largely rooted in a lack of awareness of their own bodies, as well as a lack of connection to purpose and to others. These aspects of life could not be directly addressed by modern medicine, but more easily accessed through the arts, and dance in particular. 

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In 2017, Xin went on to pursue dance full-time, training at Ev & Bow in Sydney, Australia. In 2018, she was selected to be the Rogue resident with STRUT in Perth, Australia – a program that funds dancers from non-traditional pathways to participate in world-class professional workshops. She was fortunate to work with artists from international companies such as Hofesh Shechter and Kidd Pivot, as well as workshops on interdisciplinary collaborations led by Australian artists such as Stephanie Lake & Robin Fox. In 2019, she moved to Israel to dance in the Kibbutz Contemporary Dance Company's Dance Journey Program. From 2020-21, Xin moved to Vancouver, where she worked with Lesley Telford & Heather Myers through the Performance Research Project. 

Xin was the inaugural Studio 7 resident at the PS Art Space in 2022, where she presented the pilot of i² , her first full-length work, an immersive live art installation funded by the City of Fremantle.

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In 2023, as part of her ongoing development of i²  with customised motion sensing interactive dance technology, she created Splice (2023), a short work commissioned for 600s with The Blue Room Theatre, which was later re-commisioned for Screen for Dreams at The Rechabite, and developed into a full-length work, a model of dance and discussion designed to help people navigate life's choices, presented with Fremantle Theatre Company in 2024.

Xin completed her Bachelor of Performing Arts (Honours) 1st at the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts on leadership in interdisciplinary collaboration considering how to hold space for psychological safety and peak performance.  

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Press:

STRUT Dance Artist - Xin Hui Ong

The Dance Centre April 2021 Member Spotlight: Xin Hui Ong

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