Talia Pua is a theatre-maker, performer and designer of playful interactions.
✷ Interaction & Play Designer
I harness the power of play to design interactive experiences for community engagement, reflection and education. I’ve worked across augmented reality, desktop games and tactile interaction as a game designer, scriptwriter and project manager. Tactile interaction and lay is where my heart is at.
✷ Theatre-maker
When I’m not performing on-stage, you’ll find me off-stage hustling as a director, playwright, and set designer. In 2020, I co-founded independent theatre-company Hand Pulled Collective, which brings stories from our communities to the stage through visionary theatre.
Résumé
Employment
Game Designer, Scriptwriter and Project Manager GeoAR Games & InGame, 2020 – 2022
Project Management
Game Designer – Designing the game rules and mechanics, writing the game design document for developers and designers.
Scriptwriter – Writing all the game text e.g. instructions, facts, dialogue
Interaction and Play Developer Brightside, Auckland University of Technology, 2020 Designing a playful and interactive facilitation tool for group discussion in a workshop context.
Curatorial Intern L’Agence de Développement de la Culture Kanak, Nouméa, New Caledonia, 2019 This two week internship involved designing a proof of concept for a virtual visit for one of the current exhibitions at the Tjibaou Cultural Centre.
Costume Assistant Basement Theatre, Shift Aotearoa, 2019 For ‘AKL, Babel’ (dir. Amber Liberté). 3D modelling and printing a series of white buildings as part of a wearable city-scape costume.
Achievements - Interaction and Play Designer
Best Design Awards 2020 Finalist for Tangita i Tāngita, Student Public Good category
Best Design Awards 2019 Gold Pin Winner for Continuum, Student Public Good category
Rush Digital Award for ‘Flip Matrix’, AUT Creative Technologies Awards Night, 2019
S23M Award for trans-disciplinary practice, AUT Creative Technologies Awards Night, 2019
Achievements - Playwright
Playmarket’s Playwrights b4 25 2022 Winner for ‘Pork and Poll Taxes’
Adam New Zealand Play Award Finalist 2021 for ‘Pork and Poll Taxes’
Playmarket’s Asian Ink, 2020, for ‘Pork and Poll Taxes’
Education
Creative Technologies from Auckland University of Technology, 2017-2019