Hannah Whittaker is an interdisciplinary artist and performance maker, creating interactive installations, one on one encounters and digital experiences. Her practice centres on participatory and immersive artworks that invite audiences to engage physically, emotionally, and imaginatively with stories embedded in place, history, and community. Working across installation, light, animation, and performance, she often combines low-tech and analogue methods with digital tools to create experiences that are intuitive, hands-on, and accessible. Her projects uphold making as a shared act using simple materials, playful interaction, and craft-led approaches to encourage deeper attention, collective memory, and lasting connection.

Hannah has worked and collaborated with artists and organisations including: Tom Marshman, Anna Braithewaite, 30 Bird Productions, 51zero, Electric Medway, Chronic Insanity, Yoko Ishiguro, Rob Young and Dani Ploeger.

She has performed and shown work at a various venues including: Battersea Arts Centre, Turner Contemporary, Cambridge Junction, Cockpit Theatre, Camden People’s Theatre, Tate Britain, Rich Mix, The Island, Kensington Olympia, CLF Art Cafe.

Hannah studied Drama and Performance Studies at London South Bank University where she gained a First Class Honours Degree and was awarded the Course Director’s award for Outstanding Achievement before continuing her studies to gain a Masters Degree in Contemporary Performance Making at Brunel University. 

Coverage on Hannah's work:

‘Hannah Whittaker is a London-based artist who brings communities together through playful, immersive projects that spark curiosity, creativity, and connection.’ Read full interview

‘Professional artist Hannah Whittaker led the collaborative project Draw Hope which invited individuals with lived experience of self-harm or suicide to craft unique trees capturing their life journey and aspirations’

During lockdown many couples have had to negotiate sharing a workspace with a partner while coping with isolation from their work colleagues. On first sight, Hannah Whittaker’s Emotional Distancing looks like a nine box Zoom meeting screen with two …

- David Andrews
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‘During lockdown many couples have had to negotiate sharing a workspace with a partner while coping with isolation from their work colleagues. On first sight, Hannah Whittaker’s Emotional Distancing looks like a nine box Zoom meeting screen with two people awaiting the arrival of the other seven. What she does with this scenario in 60 seconds is hilarious and a rye comment on the irony of this new working context.’

‘Hannah Whittaker produced a large, vibrant floor installation, Parquet Picioare which was installed in the chancel at St Margaret’s Church Leytonstone. The installation was inspired by the concept of the dance floor and each individual tile bore the footprint of a member of the church’s congregation and wider community, with the overall pattern influenced by Romanian design in recognition of the Romanian Orthodox congregation based at St Margaret’s.’

Ever felt like all art is a one-direction monologue, asking nothing but brain freeze from its viewer? Artist Hannah Millest certainly has. Some time back she developed an interactive art piece that dragged the viewer out of its passive slumber and forced us back into the driving seat: the artwork, Run to Run, meant the viewer had some legwork to do to get some arty rewards. The concept is an interesting one and now Run to Run has developed from its humble beginnings into the size of an exhibition. All the work included requires the viewer to spring back to life and get involved. Every piece will have an element of interactive-ness: the viewer is the one that moves, rather than the image (but sometimes that does too). The viewer is required to ‘perform’ the artwork… if they want to see an animation of a bike, they best get on their bike, so to speak. It’s a real see, play touch event, unusual for an art exhibition but a recipe that always ends in a lot of laughs. The exhibition will take place at the cultural hub that is the Bussey Building in Peckham, well-known for its experimental evenings of dance, art and music. The exhibition runs over 3 evenings and is rounded off by a closing party on Tuesday 28th January. The exhibition is free to enter and is sure to be a fun filled evening… so may I suggest a sweatband and your best running spikes! - Laura Thornley http://www.theculturalexpose.co.uk/arts-culture/something-you-should-see-run-to-run/

- Laura Thornley
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‘Ever felt like all art is a one-direction monologue, asking nothing but brain freeze from its viewer? Artist Hannah Millest certainly has… The concept is an interesting one and now Run to Run has developed from its humble beginnings into the size of an exhibition… The viewer is required to ‘perform’ the artwork… if they want to see an animation of a bike, they best get on their bike, so to speak. It’s a real see, play touch event, unusual for an art exhibition but a recipe that always ends in a lot of laughs.’

Total Theatre - Tempting Failure Review Hannah Millest’s Run to Run was a participatory, durational piece that engaged audiences throughout the evening, set up at the back of the Main Space. Millest’s interactive project required participants to sta…

Total Theatre - Tempting Failure Review - Natalie Raven
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‘This piece was addictive. Each time I tried that little bit harder, and each time I seemed to fail right at the last hurdle. If ever a piece encapsulated the term ‘tempting failure’, it was this.’