DIANE TORR is a performance artist, writer, director and educator who developed her career in New York over a period of 25 years. In the past three years, she has taken up residence in Glasgow, where she was invited to teach an interdisciplinary course at Glasgow School of Art, and to work with the company Mischief-La Bas, Glasgow, in a new devised production, Painful Creatures (2004). She had previously worked with them on a production of Bull(1998) at Tramway. Her solo performances, in which she impersonates various male characters, “are rendered with an understated intensity in their close inspection of so-called masculine characteristics.”(The Villager, NYC). She has also found a niche in popular culture as the creator of Drag King Workshops, which she began teaching in 1989. Diane presents her solo performances in performance venues, museums and theatre festivals - including PS122 New York, Whitney Museum, New York, I.C.A. London, SUSHI San Diego, TNT Bordeaux, and Schmidt Theatre, Hamburg. Her group works, in which she directs and sometimes performs, are frequently adaptations from literature, such as Maldoror’s Grey Lark (from Lautreamont’s Les Chants de Maldoror) or deal with specific issues such as identity and cross dressing, as in Context:Desire (1995), and are produced by such venues as The Arches, Glasgow, Oval House Theatre, London, Judson Church and La Mama Theatre, New York. In teaching her gender transformation workshops, Diane has worked extensively in the gay and trans communities in New York, and through Glasgow Women’s Library, Glasgay, Diverse Arts, and Glasgow University. In 1995, BBC2 interviewed Diane and presented her work as part of its QED series. She is the main protagonist in Gabriel Baur’s feature film VENUS BOYZ (2002), and her work has been the subject of profiles in publications including: The Scotsman, Glasgow Herald, GQ, Washington Post, Village Voice, The Guardian, The Independent, German Vogue and others. In July 2002, Torr co-directed “godrag!” in Berlin – the First International Festival of women performing femininity, masculinity, androgyny, and drag in theatre and cabaret. This festival represented ten years of Torr’s teaching and performing in theatre and art academies throughout Europe, with performances by Torr and by ex-students and colleagues from New York, Berlin, Leeds, Vienna, Italy and Scandinavia. In 2003, Torr received her MFA from the Milton Avery Graduate Center for the Arts, Bard College, New York. She holds a third degree black belt in Aikido from New York Aikiki, where she practised the Japanese martial art of Aikido for 25 years. Diane is a Fellow of the Whitney Museum Independent Studies Program and of the Macdowell Art Colony. Personal grants and awards include New York State Council on the Arts, Jerome Foundation, Lila Wallace Readers Digest Fund, Yorkshire Arts, and Art Matters, among others.

2006
Escena Contemporanea Festival, Madrid; Khoj Workshop, New Delhi; Chez Bushwick, Brooklyn, New York; CCA (Centre for Contemporary Art), Sauchiehall Street, Glasgow; University of Colorado at Boulder
2005
“Brother for a Day” event, Brunswick Hotel, Glasgow; Spring Festival, University College, Chichester; Glasgow University Theatre Department; Chapelle Fromentin, La Rochelle, France; Arteleku, San Sebastian, Spain; Le Petit Versailles, New York; Santa Fe Art Center
2004
New Georges Theatre, New York; Club Wotever, London; Glasgow School of Art; Buff Club, Glasgow; Schwuz Club. Berlin;
2003
Hanbury Ballroom, Brighton; Club Tapis Rouge, New York; Living Room Project, Hudson, New York; Open Ohr Festival, Mainz; The Arches, Glasgow; TNT, Bordeaux
2002
Nazareth College, New York; Godrag! Festival Berlin; PS122, NYC
2001
Bard College, New York; North London University; Sarah Lawrence College, NY
2000
T. Junction, Vienna; RE.AL, Lisbon; Slipper Room, NYC
1999
Migros Museum, Zurich; Studio Theatre, Leeds; Magma, Istanbul
1998
Solo Mio Festival, San Francisco; Tramway, Glasgow; Sushi, San Diego; Theatre des Augenblicks, Vienna
1997
The Albany Theatre, London; Waves 97 Festival, Vordingborg, Denmark; Helsinki Act Festival, Finland; Dartington Hall, Totnes
1996
Schmidt Theatre, Hamburg; Oval House Theatre, London; ZAP Club, Brighton;
Intermedia, Minneapolis
1995
Judson Church, NYC; ICA, London; Club Roxy, Amsterdam; Dixon Place, NYC
1994
NAAO Conference, Miami; SNDO, Amsterdam
1993
ICA Boston; Tansprojekt, Cologne; Die Werkstatt, Dusseldorf; Dance Lab, Bristol;
Zap Club, Brighton
1992
La Mama Theatre, NYC; Hamilton Artists Inc. Ontario
1990
Public Theatre, NYC; Franklin Furnace, NYC
1989
A Space, Toronto; Saw Gallery, Ottawa; ACE Art, Winnipeg; Artspace, Peterborough, Ont.
1988
St. Marks Church Danspace, NYC; New Langton Arts, San Francisco; Interarts, Los Angeles; Starck Club, Dallas
1987
14K Kabaret, Baltimore
1986
Pyramid Club, NYC
1985
Creative Time, NYC
1984
Movement Research, NYC
1983
PS1, NYC; Limbo Lounge, NYC
1982
de Zaak, Groningen; Melkweg, Amsterdam; Paradiso, Amsterdam; Metropole, Berlin; Festival of Madness, Ghent; Stalker Theatre, Brussels; King Tut’s Wa-Wa Hut, NYC
1981
WOW Festival, NYC; Club 57, NYC; Mudd Club, NYC; TR3 NYC
1980
Just Above Mid-Town Gallery, NYC; Times Square Show, NYC
1979
Interart Theatre, NYC
1978
X-6 Dance Space, London; Nova Scotia School of Art and Design, Halifax.

2000/2001

2006
Festival Escena Contemporanea, Madrid; National School of Drama, New Delhi; Theatre Company Amil Allana, New Delhi; University of Aberystwyth; University of Leeds; Hope Martin Studio, New York
2005
Chapelle Fromentin, La Rochelle, WASPS Studios, Glasgow, Arteleku, San Sebastian
2004
AHA Studio, Berlin; WASPS Studios, Glasgow; MANFEST, New George’s Theatre, New York
2003
Tout Nouveau Theatre, Bordeaux; Glasgow Women’s Library; Theatre Department, University of Munich, Glasgay, Scotland
2002
Mercury Lounge, Glasgow; Glasgow Women’s Library; “godrag!” Festival – Rosengarten Café Studio, Berlin; Playback Theatre, Zurich; Broome Street Studio, New York; Cochran Studio, New York
2001
Department of Continuing Education, Theatre Academy, Helsinki; Segue Studio, New York; Central School of Speech and Drama, London
2000
El Bohio, New York; Segue Studio, New York, TanzBremen Festival, Germany; RE.AL, Lisbon, Idea Performance, Dance and Theatre, Bolzano, Italy
1999
Segue Studio, New York; Central School of Speech and Drama, London; “Zwischen Club und Cyber”, Theater Symposium, Braunschweig, Germany; Theatre des Augenblicks, Vienna; Kara “K” (ginsen haller), Istanbul; Migros Museum, Zurich
1998
Segue Studio, New York; Tramway, Glasgow
1997
Segue Studio, New York; Gayle King Show, New York; WAVES97 Festival, Vordingborg, Denmark; Helsinki Act Festival, Finland; West Yorkshire Playhouse
1996
Segue Studio, New York; Schmidt Theatre, Hamburg; Tanz und Theater, Hannover; Schwule Sau, Hanover; Die Werkstatt, Dusseldorf; erotisch aber indiskret Festival, Zurich; Pilotprojekt MURU, Bern; Oval House Theatre, London; Goldsmiths College, London; genders that be Festival, Minneapolis
1995
Segue Studio, New York; Movement Research, New York; Artists Space, New York; El Bohio Studio, New York; Pelze, Berlin; Randolph Street Gallery, Chicago; Tanz und Theater, Hanover; Club Roxy, Amsterdam; I.C.A. London
1994
Segue Studio, New York; I.C.A. London; Melkweg, Amsterdam; SNDO Amsterdam; N.A.A.O. Conference, Miami; Franklin Furnace, New York
1993
El Bohio, New York; EDDC, Arnhem; I.C.A. Boston; Simmons College, Boston; CAL Arts, LA
1992
Annie Sprinkle’s Salon, New York; EDDC, Arnhem
1989-91
Annie Sprinkle’s Salon, New York

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