Annette Mees

Chair of the Board, 2022–2026

Annette Mees is an award-winning creative producer, innovation dramaturg and cultural strategist with over twenty years’ experience working across major cultural institutions, universities and international partners. She served as Chair of the Board of FutureEverything from 2022 to 2026.

Her work combines artistic leadership with cross-sector collaboration and a deep understanding of how ambitious interdisciplinary projects are developed and delivered. She specialises in supporting artists and new work through labs, residencies and collaborative R&D, and in designing international cultural programmes that are both strategically grounded and artistically rigorous.

Annette founded and directed Audience Labs, the innovation department at the Royal Opera House, working with partners including Google Creative Lab, Magic Leap and the Imaginarium Studios. Under her leadership the programme became the first opera house initiative to win Best Out-of-Home Experience at the International VR Awards. Earlier in her career she co-founded and served as Artistic Director of the immersive theatre company Coney, whose internationally touring work pioneered participatory and location-based storytelling.

Her projects span continents and forms. She co-curated Liquid Becomings for the European Cultural Foundation, a major commission exploring the future of Europe through artist crews travelling four European waterways. She developed a multi-platform development programme for the National Arts Centre in Canada, co-authored the Venues of the Future Toolkit with NiTE/DEN in the Netherlands, and contributed to the strategic and programming development of ARCĒD, the immersive venue at the Wales Millennium Centre.

Annette advises cultural organisations, funders and public bodies including the House of Lords, Arts Council England, the AHRC and the Greater London Authority. She is also a sought-after speaker and mentor for interdisciplinary artists, working with organisations such as the Gulbenkian Foundation, BFI, Immersive Arts, CPH:LAB and XO Labs.