A photo of Brighton Dome's 4 in house artists.

In-House Artists Alumni

Our In-House Artists Scheme, launched in 2021, has alumni including Akila Richards, Tanushka Marah, Emma Frankland and Victoria Fox Markiewicz

Following a fantastic response to the first In-House Artists call-out, over 50 applications came in from local artists from diverse backgrounds and experience in a wide range of artforms.

The applications were reviewed and discussed by an independent panel working across the arts sector in Brighton & Hove: Jenny Williams (Take The Space); David Sheppeard (Marlborough Productions/The Spire); Terry Adams (Anonymous Arts, Arts Council England Diversity); Laura McDermott (Creative Director, Attenborough Centre for the Creative Arts) and Kyla Booth-Lucking (Director of Programming & Participation, Brighton Dome & Brighton Festival).

The four selected artists, Akila Richards, Tanushka Marah, Emma Frankland and Victoria Fox Markiewicz each received a £10,000 grant to support their work and to contribute their input to Brighton Dome & Brighton Festival’s programming, artist decision-making and strategic direction.

Learn more about our In-House Artist alumni below:

Akila Richards

Akila Richards is an award-winning writer, poet and spoken word artist. Some of her writing gives voice to the Black German experience. Her performances and readings take place in a variety of international artistic, cultural and community settings including Mboka in Gambia and UK, as well as in Berlin, Liberia and Saint Lucia. Penguin published Akila’s first short story Eleven Years. Her poems and short fiction have also been featured by Peepal Tree Press; Red Saviour in the Red anthology as well as Secret Chamber (also adapted for a theatre play) in Closure and The Givers and Alzheimer in Filigree: Black British Contemporary Poetry.  

She received an award for her poem Stifled Life and Waterloo Press published her joint anthology initiative Ink On My Lips. Her creative work also included a multi–lingual sound scape for Dulwich Picture Gallery for Journeys, participation in an exhibition for Constructed Geographies and year-long writer’s residency at Creative Future. She was Community Writing Co-Curator for Tenebrae: Lessons Learnt in Darkness at Brighton Festival 2021.

Akila is an accredited coach and works as a LITUP mentor/manager with Waterloo Press supporting poets to be published for the first time.

'I appreciate being part of a most interesting and purposeful cohort for the In House Artist residency. Artistically I am eager to create a new body of work on 'Rest My Resistance' to include poetry, digital art, collaborations, and meaningful exchanges with participants at different timelines. I look forward to producing a 'happening' at Brighton Dome for artists and audiences of colour.'
Akila Richards

Tanushka Marah

Tanushka founded and was the artistic director of Company: Collisions which toured for 10 years all across the UK and abroad both in theatres and outdoors. She was a winner of one of The Genesis Young Vic Young Director Awards at the Jerwood in 2002. Her production of Medea, developed at the Young Vic, toured international festivals in Cyprus and Albania, representing British Classical Theatre. Two of her original works appeared in London's International Mime Festival. Rest Upon The Wind sold out at Riverside Studios and Tristan Bates before touring extensively in the Middle East during 2012.  

She now works as a freelance director and movement coach. She has also directed two shows for apprentice actors/emerging artists at Liverpool, Hope Street and Aberystwyth Arts Centre. In 2017 she worked with Brighton People's Theatre as a guest director on Tighten Our Belts (devised political theatre). She was a dramaturg on the verbatim play Semites in London 2018. She also runs a youth theatre company ThirdSpace (formerly Windmill Young Actors) whose production of Berkoff's Agamemnon won The Outstanding Theatre Award at Brighton Fringe 2017, and their most recent production was an Arts Council England funded, large scale outdoor production of Romeo and Juliet in Hollingdean Skatepark. She worked as Movement Director on Royal Shakespeare Company's performance of A Museum in Baghdad.

'I am honoured to receive this grant and hope to use this opportunity to help influence accessibility to culture. I am passionate about the high-quality of work young people create and should have access to and this will enable me to develop my skills and make new connections with other artists, as part of a conscious movement to diversify arts and culture in our city.'
Tanushka Marak

Emma Frankland

Emma Frankland is a live performance and theatre artist. Her work often focuses on honesty, action and a playfully destructive DIY aesthetic using materials with different transformative properties - such as water, clay, earth, salt, and ink - to create strong visual imagery, which is often messy, intense, and celebratory.

In recent years, her work has been focussed on the None of Us is Yet a Robot project, a series of performance pieces published by Oberon Books as None of Us is Yet a Robot - Five Performances on Gender Identity and the Politics of Transition. In 2013, Emma was a featured artist at the British Council Showcase. Emma has performed in Sao Paolo, Rio de Janeiro, Jakarta, Toronto and across the UK and Europe. As a performer and dramaturg, she has collaborated with many companies including WildWorks, Rachel Mars, Marlborough Productions, Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre, Stratford Festival (ON), Theatre Royal Stratford East and for BBC radio drama and television.

'It is an honour to be in such great company as a member of the inaugural In House Artist project and I am excited to learn about and collaborate with my fellow artists over the coming year. It is significant that Brighton Dome have made this commitment towards more inclusive practice, and I am hopeful to see the Dome become a relevant venue for Queer and trans artists and audiences in Brighton and beyond. Personally, during this period, I am excited to develop my production of Galatea, a 500-year-old play with a queer and trans romantic plot - demonstrating that we have always been here!'
Emma Frankland

Victoria Fox Markiewicz

Victoria is Artistic Director and choreographer for Brighton-based company TRIBE//, creating highly physical, emotive movement driven dance work and an associate artist at Swindon Dance and a Discovery Artist at Pavilion Dance Southwest. She has a reputation as a dancer with companies such as Jasmin Vardimon Company, CandoCo Dance Company, The British Paraorchestra and Silesian Dance Theatre Poland; she has also performed in the UK and internationally in works by Caroline Bowditch, Yael Flexer, Fin Walker and Athena Valha. She was a commissioned choreographer for the Place Prize 2008, winning the audience vote and an award winner at Kalisz International Dance Competition, Poland. Victoria regularly teaches at UK leading dance conservatoires, professional techniques classes and is commissioned to make work from graduate companies to youth companies.

Victoria created TRIBE// in 2016. It has quickly gained a reputation for its visceral, articulate choreographic style and emotional drive, letting the movement and music speak and connect to an audience. TRIBE//'s Still I Rise was a sold-out highlight of Brighton Festival 2019 and is currently company in residence at Worthing Theatre. 

'I’m looking forward to working with this incredibly inspiring group of artists and having time to think, explore and bring local artist voices to this new way of working within Brighton Dome. The arts have a creative power to reach out, connect us city wide, ensuring a more inclusive and brighter artistic and cultural future for our city.'
Victoria Fox Markiewicz