Natalia Koliada
Natalia Koliada is the General Director and Theatre Producer, co-founder of Belarus Free Theatre alongside her husband Nikolai.
In 2008 Natalia and her husband organized the only underground Arts School, Fortinbras, in Belarus.
Natalia has been detained three times for participation in peaceful political and theatrical activities. She was the first person to be detained at a street protest against enforced disappearances in Belarus. She was convicted for publishing the Monitoring of Human Rights on the internet. Her father, Andrei Koliada, was dismissed from the Academy of the Arts for cooperation with Belarus Free Theatre and was physically attacked as a result; the criminal investigation case on it was closed down.
The Belarus Free Theatre became OBIE-winning theatre on 2011 and has received the French Republic Human Rights Prize and the Europe Theatre Prize and ArtVenture Freedom to Create Prize when the Belarus Free Theatre was called as a Global Artistic Ambassador on Human Rights.
Natalia also started the Global Artistic Campaign Free Belarus that is supported by outstanding figures of contemporary art and politics such Sir Tom Stoppard, President Vaclav Havel and Harold Pinter.