Creative Director & COO at Imvizar

Adele Keane is the co-founder and Creative Director of Imvizar, where she leads the team in crafting award-winning spatial storytelling experiences. Working across employee experience, visitor attractions, and the arts, Adele collaborates with organisations such as Salesforce, Bupa, and Grant Thornton, as well as cultural heritage sites and renowned artists throughout Europe, Australia, and the United States. Through augmented reality and location-based experiences, she helps bring stories and artworks to life to create deeper engagement with audiences.

Drawing on her expertise in spatial experience design, user experience, and storytelling, Adele also helps others create their own AR experiences using Lureo, Imvizar’s no-code tool for spatial storytelling. Her mission is to enable anyone to design meaningful location-based AR experiences that create emotional connection with audiences.

Speaking Experience: Adele has spoken at a wide range of international conferences and industry events across Europe, the US, and online, contributing as a keynote speaker, panelist and MC. Recent experience includes serving as mainstage host at UnitedXR (Brussels), presenting and participating in panels at AWE EU (Vienna) and AWE USA (California), and speaking on the main stage at Web Summit (Lisbon). Her talks and panels have covered topics such as spatial and immersive storytelling, XR, AI, digital visitor experiences, and human connection in emerging technologies, with audiences spanning tech, culture, art, and heritage sectors.

Available to Speak: Worldwide

Topics of Interest: Spatial storytelling, immersive and extended reality (XR), augmented reality, generative AI, no-code immersive tools, digital placemaking, visitor and guest experience design, cultural and heritage storytelling, ethics of emerging technology, connection and empathy in digital experiences, future of storytelling, location-based experiences

Preferred Format: Presentation, Panel, Workshop

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Unity Developer at Imvizar

4 years creating immersive storytelling experiences in 10+ countries with other 50.000 visits across 50+ experiences.

Available to Speak: Worldwide

Topics of Interest: Immersive media, XR, AR, MR, interactive storytelling, Unity, tech, headsets, mobile apps

Preferred Format: Presentation

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Creative Director and CEO at The Performance Corporation. Founder of The SPACE Programme Residency.

Jo Mangan is a Creative Director, Producer, Curator, Consultant and Speaker, working across live performance and XR, with a focus on how they interface.

Her creative work with The Performance Corporation includes We Who Live Under Heaven, a mixed-reality opera integrating live performance and immersive technologies premiered at Kilkenny Arts Festival and NEMO Biennale of Digital Art, Paris; Emperor 101, a hybrid live and virtual performance work presented at SXSW, LP360 Vancouver and Dublin Theatre Festival. She also created Out of the Ordinary, a VR opera with Irish National Opera - winner of the Fedora Digital Prize.

She has curated and delivered immersive and digital work for international and national events including Design and Destroy, a VR film/exhibition as curator for Ireland at Prague Quadrennial (PQ2019) and at Carlow Arts Festival while Director there.

She founded The SPACE Programme, Ireland’s longest-running international arts and technology residency, centred on immersive experience design and AI-led artistic research.

Speaking Experience: Jo is recognised internationally as a key note speaker and event curator. Engagements include panels on consecutive years at SXSW (Austin, Texas), Jeunesses Musicales International (Bruges), FICEP (Paris), Bristol Digital Games Lab.

Recent appearances include the Key Note on AI for the Nová Dráma Festival Bratislava. In Rome, her Key Note at Life on Mars, focussed on how AI intersects with contemporary creative practice and performance contexts. She has also contributed to policy-facing discussions with Arts Council England, including a roundtable on AI and immersive technologies, bringing a practitioner-led perspective on artistic practice, ethics, delivery and sector impact.

For the International Performing Arts Network - IETM plenary meeting in Sofia, Bulgaria, she curated and spoke at a hands on session called AI, Immersive Tech & Creativity. She designed and led Can AI be your newest Creative Collaborator for Performing Arts Forum, and conceived, curated and delivered a symposium for Dublin City Council - Arts, Tech and the City, bringing artists, technologists and policy stakeholders together to examine how AI and immersive technologies are reshaping public space, cultural practice and urban life. She also regularly presents and facilitates at 3rd level institutions.

Across these contexts, her talks have focused on AI-assisted immersive experience design, use of emerging technologies, and the practical realities of producing XR work within arts contexts. Jo is known for a practitioner-led perspective grounded in delivery, audiences, production workflows and long-term cultural sustainability, rather than speculative or tech-led rhetoric.

Available to Speak: Worldwide

Topics of Interest: AI in the Arts, Immersive and XR Experience Design, AI-Assisted Creative Practice, Mixed and Extended Reality Storytelling, Live Performance and Emerging Technologies, Immersive Practice in Museums and Cultural Institutions, Producing XR Work in Arts Contexts, Ethics and Sustainability in Creative Technologies, Audience Experience Design, Cultural Leadership and Technology Policy, Interdisciplinary Arts and Tech Collaboration

Preferred Format: Presentation, Panel, Workshop

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CEO & Founder at Starilum

Dora Jean Gillespie is a visual artist and creative entrepreneur whose work centres on connection, community, and emotional resonance.

She works primarily with the music industry, creating traditional and immersive visual worlds that help audiences engage more deeply with songs, stories, and artists but her practice is not limited to music.

Her work explores how visuals can bring people together, spark shared feeling, and create spaces where audiences don’t just consume content, but connect through it.

Driven by storytelling, psychology, and culture, Dora Jean’s work sits at the intersection of art, technology, and human experience.

Speaking Experience: Dora Jean Gillespie has extensive experience as a speaker, presenter, and visual arts educator across Ireland, the UK, Europe, Australia, and Denmark. She has spoken both as a touring presenter and as a visual arts judge and teacher, working with creatives, students, and industry professionals.

She also hosts a podcast exploring AI and the human experience, visual arts, creativity, with a focus on neurodiverse teams, and the benefits of data as a driver. Her talks bridge creative practice and emerging technology, translating complex concepts into accessible, human-centred insights.

Her current speciality is the practical use of AI as a creative support tool showing how AI can streamline repetitive tasks, expand creative exploration, and remove friction in the creative process, allowing creatives to focus more deeply on what we enjoy by way of creating meaning, storytelling, and connection. Her work supports human intuition and creativity.

Available to Speak: Worldwide

Topics of Interest: AI and the human experience, visual storytelling as a tool for connection and community, creativity and emerging technology, neurodiverse teams and inclusive ways of working, human-centred use of AI, music and audience engagement, immersive and interactive experiences, storytelling that builds belonging.

Preferred Format: Presentation, Panel, Workshop

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Lecturer, PI, Director of engCORE at
South East Technological University - Carlow

David is a lecturer in Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering, and the Director of engCORE. He is also a very active researcher (both fundamental and applied) in which his main areas of research are bulk, SMART and Sustainable Materials, surface degradation and smart technologies, 3D printing, innovative design, and VR/AR/XR/360 content development. He has successfully delivered, since arriving in SETU Carlow, on Research projects worth a combined total of over €5m and over €1.5m for infrastructural investments. He collaborates with a wide range of national and international institutes throughout Ireland and across Europe.

David has delivered large and small projects in the IT, Construction, and academic arenas, he has supported global teams during extensive IT network upgrades, and he has developed academic programmes, implemented Training Courses as part of an ISO 9000 initiative, generating over €3m to support some of these developments. He was also active in delivering Athena Swan to SETU, and he also participates in several COST Actions, and the CIRCULÉIRE programme.

Speaking Experience: David has spoken across the globe at conferences, he has been involved in a number of podcasts and radio broadcasts, and he has delivered CPD workshops.

Available to Speak: Europe

Topics of Interest: Applied and Fundamental Research, XR/VR in Education, Pedagogy,

Preferred Format: Presentation, Panel, Workshop

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