Venue: Balam Balam Place
15 Phoenix Street,
Brunswick, Victoria 3056
BOOKINGS ARE OPEN!
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Click for Timetable and Workshop Details
Feedback from our last conference was that you wanted more hands-on work, so we will have you on your feet and looking at how to apply the Alexander Technique. There will be many exciting workshops run by our experienced Australian Teachers, including Jenny Thirtle, Cathy Dowden, Anne Carroll, Julianne Eveleigh, Bronwyn Munro, Michael Avery, Ric Pellizzeri, Helene Goldberg, Karen Anderson, Michael Stenning, Leonardo Canales, Penny McDonald, and a very exciting panel on personal training and the Alexander Technique with Elke Rudolf, David Moore, and Caroline Blackshaw.
We are inviting people who are new to the Alexander Technique to come to a special introductory afternoon and experience 2 introductory workshops.
This is a great line up of presenters and we look forward to learning, exploring and spending time with you!
AUSTAT Conference 2026:
Day 1: Friday 16 October (5pm – 9pm)
Day 2: Saturday 17 October (9am – 5pm)
Conference Dinner (optional): Saturday 17 October (6.30pm – 10pm)
Day 3: Sunday October 18 (9am – 5pm)
Full Conference Ticket price includes a light dinner on Friday night and lunch on Saturday and Sunday.
The Saturday night dinner is an extra option which we encourage all conference participants to attend. This year it will be held at the Edinburgh Castle Hotel. Have a look at their website to get a feel for this fun venue with excellent food and wine.
Lynne Conway
Begin the day by stepping into movement. This gentle tai chi class explores the shared territory between tai chi and the Alexander Technique: natural coordination, effortless balance, and movement initiated from a deep, responsive centre. Through a sequence of simple, accessible tai chi forms, we will cultivate an alert, calm state of presence, allowing the body to organise itself with greater coordination and flow. Rather than focusing on perfect form, we will emphasise the experience of moving from a more integrated whole.
No previous tai chi experience is necessary. Come as you are, and leave feeling ready to engage with the learning, conversations, and discoveries ahead.
Anne Carroll
Using a slow, mindful movement exploration, Functional Anatomy and discussion you will be guided to explore the spiralling connections of fascial and muscular pathways, which connect the body to its natural, fluid movement potential.
From infancy these patterns are central to organising progress from turning, rolling, crawling, sitting and eventually walking and running. Over a lifetime this capacity may become diminished or lost, reducing ease and freedom in everyday life. This workshop seeks to illuminate and improve this vital capacity.
Anne Carroll is currently in the final year of Feldenkrais Practitioner training and is an authorised teacher of Awareness Through Movement. This workshop will draw on this training as well as her Alexander Technique training to provide a space for inquiry and exploration.
Karen Anderson
This workshop offers a playful and practical window into Karen's group teaching process — including the discoveries that continue to emerge from her ongoing work with performing artists.
Karen Anderson maintains an active Alexander Technique practice across performing arts institutions, group classes, intensive workshops, and private teaching.
Bronwyn Munro
Active inference is an evolving neuroscientific framework that provides a unified theory of the mind, brain and behaviour. It states that we use prediction to perceive the world and to guide action – we are prediction machines. In this workshop I will provide an overview of active inference along with an opportunity to actively explore its relationship to teaching the Alexander Technique.
Penny McDonald
We are 4 footed animals and the power comes from our haunches. In this workshop we will look at how are arms are our front legs, and our hands are our front feet. We will explore using our arms in relation to our powerful back legs. It helps take the end-gaining out of what ever we are doing. Animals are always listening, freely breathing, present and spatially aware. Thinking of an animal as you work, garden, drive etc helps you function from a grounded and connected place.
Attending this workshop will require some homework beforehand, you need to have studied an animal, taking note of its rhythm, weight, breath, how it moves, if it is a pack animal, and how it stays tuned into the vibrations of the universe.
David Moore, Elke Rudolph and Caroline Blackshaw
The conference will also feature a panel discussion exploring the benefits and potential pitfalls of working with weights and weight training. The panel brings together a range of perspectives and experience: David Moore, who has extensive experience in Alexander Technique education and teacher training and is currently completing his Certificate 4 in Personal Training; Elke Rudolph, who integrates physiotherapy and Alexander work in her clinical practice; and Caroline Blackshaw, who combines Alexander Technique with strength training, yoga and movement-based fitness approaches. Together, the panel will discuss different perspectives and approaches to weight training and explore how Alexander Technique teachers can enhance a client’s experience of working with weights, making the process safer, more efficient, and more comfortable. The panel will also address common areas of conflict between Alexander Technique and historical methods of weight training.
Cathy Dowden
Curious about the Alexander Technique? This gentle, hands-on workshop offers an
introduction to a practical method for improving comfort, coordination and wellbeing in everyday life.
Through simple guided activities, you'll discover how reducing unnecessary tension can help you move more freely, breathe more easily, and feel steadier and more balanced. You'll explore practical skills that can be applied to sitting, standing, walking, lifting and other daily activities, and leave with a simple strategy to continue using at home.
Suitable for all ages, mobility levels and experience, this workshop is ideal for anyone new to the Alexander Technique or wanting a refresher.
Following the workshop and afternoon tea, participants may book a complimentary 10-minute one-to-one hands-on session with an Alexander Technique teacher.
Helene Goldberg and Penny McDonald
You know the Alexander Technique changes lives. So why isn't your practice full?
In this energising workshop, we'll dig into the marketing habits that are quietly shaping your practice - the ones working in your favour, and the ones holding you back. Because the truth is, most teachers aren't struggling with skill. They're struggling to talk about what they do.
The key to filling your books isn't a clever tactic. It's enthusiasm. It's remembering what the Alexander Technique did for you - what changed, what clicked, what felt like a small miracle - and finding the words to tell that story so others want it too.
This is one of the most profound methods on the planet. It's time we owned that, and started promoting it like we mean it.
If your diary isn't full, it's not because the work doesn't matter. It's because not enough people know it exists yet.
We believe every Alexander Technique teacher can build a full-time practice. This workshop is our push to help you make that happen.
Riccardo Pellizzeri
This workshop is a playful exploration of ‘mind blowing’ modern scientific facts and perspectives and how they can be applied to the Alexander Technique. Topics such as guided imagination, atomic mass, empty space and baseballs, three hundred theories of consciousness (and counting), cognitive updating, mindreading and the occasional challenge, such as, ‘How many AT teachers does it take to change a lightbulb? One to change the lightbulb and the rest thinking they wouldn’t do it that way.
Jenny Thirtle
Explorations of common problems in the Singer's world, with a light on "the whole system vs specific instruction".
Julianne Eveleigh
Breath is where Alexander Technique thinking meets doing — yet it's often gestured at rather than actually worked. This dynamic, experiential session gets teachers into the muscular reality of breath: what's really happening in the ribs, diaphragm, and deep postural muscles when breath is free rather than merely permitted.
Michael Stenning
What are Traditional Procedures about?
How can we start to approach the deep skills which a past generation of teachers had?
Supporting a vibrant community of teachers since 1985.
Promoting the benefits of the transformative Alexander Technique in Australia and Taiwan.
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