Lisa Maris McDonell is a dance artist working on Dharawal country (South Coast, NSW, Australia). Her practice embraces performance, choreography, video, sound, Flamenco and therapeutic dance. She is a graduate of the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts.

Lisa has been creating and presenting performance and video works in various contexts in since 1996 in over twelve countries. She has been commissioned to create works for numerous companies and training institutions both in Australia and overseas.

In 2020 Lisa began presenting her work under the title Proper Motion in an effort to provide further visibility and opportunity to NSW South Coast based professional dance artists. Since its inception Proper Motion has presented Lisa’s collaborative project Optimal Stopping alongside La Infinita Compañia (Mex) with performances in Australia and Mexico, created the Illawarra Dance Portraits project and launched the $20 Commissions Project, presenting its performance arm The Lobster (after The Australian colloquial term for the $20 note) as part of Merrigong Theatre Company’s MerrigongX season in 2022 as well as video iterations in Australia and the UK. The Lobster saw Lisa perform short works by over 20 choreographers from around the world, including Crystal Pite who made a work specifically for the project.

During 2021/22 Lisa invited a number of professional movers to come together for a weekly studio practice which seeks to find ways to move together whilst remaining faithful to our diverse range of movement and personal histories / experience. These artists make up the current core group of Proper Motion.

During her career Lisa has been the recipient of numerous awards, residencies and grants including an Ausdance / CNSW Innovating Dance Practice travel grant to Spain in 2020, a Readymade Works Moving Ideas residency in 2021 and is the 2022/23 Sydney Dance Company / Create New South Wales Beyond the Studio Fellowship recipient.

Lisa regularly teaches workshops for professional and pre-professional dancers and actors. Her teaching credits include the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts (Edith Cowan University), Bangarra Dance Theatre, Sydney Dance Company public classes and PPY, NAISDA Dance College, University of Wollongong, Coláiste Stiofáin Naofa (Ireland) and Ankara State Conservatory (Turkey) amongst many others.