About

Gaurav Singh Nijjer (b. 1994, New Delhi) is an Indian theatre-maker, creative technologist, arts researcher, multidisciplinary designer and marketer.
 

As a theatre-maker, his artistic practice investigates live performance and audience-performer interactivity using technology and distanced composition. He brings together his training in spontaneous improvisation, interest in multilingual theatre and his professional experience in marketing, technology and design to explore new ways of engaging audiences, in the theatre, at home and otherwise. He is one half of the Delhi-based theatre collective Kaivalya Plays.

Originally from New Delhi, he recently completed the German Chancellor Fellow (Bundeskanzler-Stipendium) where he conducted a 12-month arts research project on audiences for digital theatre and hybrid performances with the Berlin-based Rimini Protokoll as his host organization.

He graduated with MA in Advanced Theatre Practice (Distinction) at the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama in 2021, receiving the prestigious Chevening Scholarship from the UK Government. In 2021, he co-directed and designed ‘Lifeline 99 99’, a unique one-on-one interactive performance on the telephone that re-imagined performance formats for the pandemic and received widespread critical acclaim. He served as the technical director for ‘The Flabby Breasted Virgin & Other Sordid Tales’, a playful, irreverent digital performance exploring how women's bodies are taught, perceived and practised within medical education in India. In 2021, he received two grants under the C3: Codes, Creativity and Community program by Goethe-Institut India and BeFantastic to create open-source community platforms for arts funding and arts education. In 2022, he joined the BeFantastic Within AI & Performing Arts Fellowship and subsequently received an artistic research grant towards Climateprov, a hybrid theatre project that brings together generative AI and improvised theatre to kickstart conversations about the climate crisis. 

As an arts manager, Gaurav is the General Manager at Kaivalya Plays, a Delhi-based independent theatre company known for their work in applied improvisation and adaptation of foreign-language texts. Here, Gaurav co-created the Theatre Management Fellowship, a unique training initiative that focuses on the strategic management and creative administration of theatre. Under Kaivalya Plays, Gaurav also directed Lifeline 99 99 (2021) and Luz Negra (2020), devised Aguebao (2019) and performed in Unravel (2018). He is also the Communications & Community Manager at The Nursery Theatre, a London-based improvisational theatre company with students, performers and audiences spread out across the world. He also reviews theatre and art experiences for the UK-based platform North West End UK.

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As an actor and director, Gaurav is a performer and founding member of The Living Room Collective and El Clavileno, the latter being India’s only Spanish language theatre group. He previously worked at one of the oldest and most prominent cultural institutions in Delhi, the Little Theatre Group (LTG) Auditorium as a consultant, overseeing their marketing operations and curating programs for their new black box studio, The Blank Canvas. His acting credits include Yasmine Reza’s Art, Manav Kaul’s Peele Scooter Waala Aadmi, Kristo Sagor’s Threesome Without Simone and Jorge Luis Borges’ Funes The Memorious, among other work in Hindi, English, and Spanish. He has previously directed plays like Alvaro Leal’s Luz Negra, Badal Sircar’s Juloos and Footnotes, inspired by Yasmine Reza’s Art. He has performed at festivals like ReConnect (2020), Old World Theatre Festival (2019), AlmagroOFF Classical Theatre Festival (2019), Thespo (2017) and has received recognition at numerous educational institutions with the collegiate theatre society Fourth Wall Productions. 

As a freelance marketer, Gaurav has worked with brands like Atlan, SocialCops, Josh Talks, Parallel, FreshMenu, among others, in various capacities and occasionally offers marketing, digital and creative consulting services. He has an undergraduate degree in Management Studies from Shaheed Sukhdev College of Business Studies (SSCBS), University of Delhi with a specialization in marketing (Class of 2016).

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Last Updated: March 2023