Roxana Vilk is an award winning multi-disciplinary British/Iranian director, actor, writer, musician and composer working in music, film, TV and live performance. Her work often explores the themes of human rights, cultural identity and migration.
She has been commissioned to create work for FOR MTV, BBC, AL JAZEERA ENGLISH, AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL, BRITISH COUNCiL, COMMONWEALTH YEAR OF CULTURE, VISITING ARTS and LITERATURE WITHOUT BORDERS, WE THE CURIOUS to name a few.
SHE WAS WON SEVERAL AWARDS , MOST RECENTLY THE UNCHOSEN AWARD AT ENCOUNTERS FILM FESTIVAL BEST EXPERIMENTAL FILM AT NRFF AMSTERDAM, 2ND PRIX DU JURY AT CANNES ART FILM FESTIVAL, BEST ARTIST AWARD AT LONDON RENAISSANCE FILM FESTIVAL BEST MUSIC VIDEO AT CALIFORNIA INTERNATIONAL SHORTS FESTIVAL AND ASBURY MUSIC FESTIVAL.
( FOR A LIST OF ALL AWARDS PLEASE GO TO AWARDS PAGE )
After graduating in Social Anthropology from Edinburgh University, she went on to train in theatre at the Lecoq School of physical theatre in Paris. Later she also gained a Masters in Fine Arts, specialising in multi disciplinary work across music, film and theatre from Edinburgh College of Art.
She co-founded the physical theatre company Theatrum Botanicum with whom she toured extensively across the world, funded by the British Council. Their ground breaking physical, musical and highly visual shows winning a slate of awards including Fringe Firsts and Herald Archangels at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.
Just as the Bosnian war ended she was invited to direct the opening of the Pavarotti Music Centre in Mostar, Bosnia Herzegovina. The ground breaking music centre was founded by Luciano Pavarotti and Brian Eno. She then stayed on as part of a team of creative practitioners running workshops for children affected by war across the region, funded by War Child Netherlands. War Child approached her and her partner Peter Vilk, to start similar music led creative projects in the Republic of Georgia, for refugee IDP communities from Abkhazia and street children in Tiblisi. ECHO (European Commission - Humanitarian Aid & Civil Protection) recruited Roxana to set up similar creative projects for families and children affected by the huge earthquake in Izmet, Turkey.
For a while she settled in Edinburgh, where she began a freelance career in music performing, writing and directing both her own music theatre and film work across the UK with various companies including Boilerhouse theatre co, 30 Bird Productions, Lung Ha's Theatre company, Botanic Productions, Scottish Playwrights Studio, Zendeh and Cineworks to name a few. During that time she was also invited to create work in Iran, Bosnia Herzegovina and The Republic of Georgia.
Five years ago she moved to Bristol.
Recently she was Associate Artist at Trinity Bristol, where she was commissioned to create a large scale multi disciplinary work called Lullabies - co-created with communities across Bristol. The piece explored heritage and migration to Bristol through the sharing of lullaby songs and the personal stories behind the songs. (The project was featured on BBC Saturday Live and BBC News)
In 2022 she was Expanded Performance Inclusion Fellow with Bristol and Bath Creative R + D. The fellowship explored how new technologies can help us expand the performance practises in music and theatre in an inclusive way. This led to her becoming a resident at Pervasive Media Studios Bristol to further pursue creative projects with new technology.
Music has always been at the core of her creative practise and she is often to be found writing music. She is co-producer / singer and keyboard player with her band Vilk Collective ( previously GOL) . They have played several UK Festivals and were selected for the UK JAZZ EXPO. BBC Persian TV recorded them at the Premises Studio in Hackney and followed them as they recorded their new album.
In 2021-2 Vilk Collective and Squidsoup received Prototype funding to explore live immersive audio. Together they co-created a new immersive show ‘Circle/دایره', which they performed to sold out gigs at Bristol Trinity, Bristol Beacon & Royal Theatre Bath. Thanks to an Arts Council Touring Fund they are taking the show ‘Circle/دایره’ to Arnolfini Bristol, Portsmouth, Barbican Plymouth and Hull Freedom Festival.
She is currently recording, mixing & collaborating with Bristol musicians for a new Vilk Collective album release in 2023