Emele Ugavule is a Tokelauan, Uvean, and Fijian storyteller, working as a performer, writer, director, producer and educator. A graduate of the National Institute of Dramatic Arts, she has worked with various artists and organisations across the Pacific. Her work centres on Indigenous Oceanic storytelling, exploring themes of temporality, memory, kinship, and knowledge transmission. She is the founder of Studio Kiin, an Indigenous-led creative studio and collective, and serves as the Creative Director of Talanoa, a platform dedicated to Oceanic digital storytelling.

Emele’s developed and produced theatre work includes Kalaga Atu (Commissioned by the Art Gallery of NSW), Toe Fai! (Commissioned by BLEED Festival + Arts House), Ancestor Incarnate (Arts House and IIML), Talaucaka (Te Whaea Theatre), I am always with you (Playwriting Australia), Goodbye, Papa (Playwriting Australia).

As an orator, Emele has spoken at the NZ Young Writer’s Festival, We’re All Going to Die Festival, Pasifika Film Festival, presented at international events such as the United Nations AI for Good Summit in Zurich, Switzerland and Nuit Blanche in Tkaronto, Canada, and she was the Toi Hourua keynote speaker at the Aotearoa Digital Arts Symposium in 2024.

Emele’s essay writing has been published in The Pantograph Punch, Transmediale, SBS Voices, Seismic Temporal and her poetry has been published in Cordite Poetry and Everything That Moves, Moves Through Another.

In 2019, Emele directed Dance Rites: Meet the Dancers for Sydney Opera House. Her documentary series supported by Pacific Media Network, Pūlotu, is currently in pre-production, set for release in 2025.

Her accolades include the Creative Australia and Creative New Zealand Digital fellowship in 2022, Create NSW + Think + Do Foundation In other words residency in 2021, Critical Path Digital Residency in 2021, and Ignition Initiative Playwriting Australia in 2020. In 2024, she was a Read NZ Pōkai Tuhi writer, selected for Playmarket NZ’s Brown Ink intiative, and was the first Melanesian Emerging Pasifika Writer in Residence at the International Institute of Modern Letters, Te Herenga Waka.

PŪLOTU – Director/Producer, Studio Kiin and Pacific Media Network  – 2025

TALAUCAKA – Writer/Director – Te Whaea Theatre 2025

TOE FAI! – Writer/Director, BLEED Festival & Arts House, Aotearoa Digital Arts Symposium, The Basement Theatre  2022-2024

KALAGA ATU – Writer/Director. Art Gallery of NSW 2022

THE STARS WROTE MY NAME IN THE OCEAN – Director. HAIVETA, Nirin, Sydney Biennale 2020

DANCE RITES: MEET THE DANCERS – Director/Producer, Sydney Opera House, 2019

BROWN SKIN GIRL – Producer. Old Fitz Theatre. 2019 season

MALAPO TO MILLER reading – Director. Oceania Rising, Casual Powerhouse 2018

NANA & BERTAH reading – Director.  Festival Fatale @ Eternity Playhouse. 2018

BROWN SKIN GIRL – Producer.  Batch Festival, Griffin Theatre Company 2018

COUNTER FACE – Writer, Co-Director, Producer 2018

EXHALE – Director. Next Wave & Arts House 2018

TABU: FIJIAN KALI & HAIR RITUAL – Director. Mangere Arts Centre NZ 2018

PEHE – Director. Transoceanic Visual Exchange / Footscray Arts Centre 2018

BLACK BIRDS – Writer, Director. The Joan Sutherland Performing Arts Centre 2017