Dessislava Gavrilova
Director
dgavrilova@redhouse-sofia.org

Dessislava Gavrilova is founder-director (together with Tzvetelina Iossifova) of The Red House Centre for Culture and Debate

From 2005 onwards Dessislava Gavrilova is also Director of the Center for Arts and Culture of the Central European University, Budapest. She established and ran the Open Society Institute - Budapest Performing Arts Network Programme (1997-2000) stimulating independent artistic work and innovation across Eastern and Central Europe and the former Soviet republics. As such she established long-term programs like "Gulliver's Connect" (with Felix Meritis, Amsterdam and Kultur Kontakt, Vienna), and "East-West Arts Connect" (with Visiting Arts, London). She ran the Performing Àrts programme of the Soros Centre for the Arts from its establishment in 1994 till 1996. Dessislava Gavrilova holds and MA (with honours) in Public Policy (CEU, Budapest). She did a research on the cultural policy of Britain at the University of Oxford, UK. She holds an MA in Òheatre Studies from the National Academy of Theatre and Film Arts, Sofia and has studied film script writing at the Moscow Film Institute. She is a guest lecturer at the Cultural Studies department of Sofia University. Program host at RFI radio. Member of expert group on cultural policy change in Sofia, Bulgaria. Her publications - in national and international daily and specialized press - are on topics ranging from current civil society and public policy issues, to cultural policies and the practices of the performing arts.