Gal Naor is an Israeli Sign Language interpreter, choreographer, performer and founder of The progressive wave. In his pieces, Gal deals with the triangular relations between language, culture and identity. His intensive engagement within the Deaf social circles in Israel and Europe is significantly contributing to his artistic researches.  

Gal Naor was born in Israel in 1986. In 2004 he graduated from the theater department of Thelma-Yellin High School of Arts. In 2008 he received a scholarship from the America-Israel Cultural Foundation for his video-dance series Inserts.

He presented his student pieces The Interpreter’s Foreword (2009) at the International Exposure Festival at Tmuna Theater and Interference (2010) at the  Future of the Theater Festival in Tzavta Theater, Tel-Aviv, and at Synesthesia Festival at the interdisciplinary Hazira, Jerusalem. From 2008 to 2011, he was working as a Sign Language interpreter at the Israeli Museum in Holon. In 2010 he accomplished his linguistic research Hebrew and Israeli Sign Language – Bilingualism or Interference. Later on that year, he graduated a four-year program of performance studies at the School of Visual Theater in Jerusalem and collaborated as a creating performer with the duo-choreographers matanicola in their dance creation What on Earth which was presented in Akko Theater and Hangar-Hanamal in Jaffa. In 2011, he cooperated with the Israeli choreographer Maayan Mozes and together they have presented their piece God Is Androgynous in Intima-Dance Festival in Tel Aviv. In July 2011, he received his diploma in Israeli Sign Language interpretation at Bar-Ilan University in Ramat-Gan, Israel. Since 2012 his poems are published in Maayan Magazine for Poetry, Prose, Arts and Ideas. In 2013 his Video-Performance Insert Number 7 was shown in Façade Video Festival in Plovdiv, Bulgaria. In the same year, he was hired as a dramaturge for the theater production Save Your Love, which was shown in Theaterdiscounter, Berlin and at the Israel Festival in Jerusalem. In 2014 he created in collaboration with matanicola his debut interdisciplinary dance performance bodieSLANGuage with Deaf and hearing performers, coproduced by Theater Freiburg and Ballhaus Ost, Berlin and sponsored by the Capital Cultural Fund of Berlin (HKF). In June 2015 Gal Naor was invited to take part in the Watch&Talk discussions panel at Wildwuchs Festival in Basel, Switzerland, which dealt with Otherness and Disabilities in the world of theater and dance. In December 2015 he was invited for Tanzlabor-21 Residency Program in Mousonturm theater in Frankfurt, where he has started working on his solo piece Lights & Vessels, the first chapter in The progressive wave’s performance trilogy Science of Signs, coproduced by ID Festival, Berlin. In 2016  he was invited by D-LAB dance company in Shanghai, China, to work as a dramaturge for the piece Transfiguration by choreographer Matan Zamir. Later on that year he premiered with his debut scientific solo piece (Science of Signs I: Lights & Vessels) at Radialsystem V, Berlin. In 2017 he was invited by Theater Thikwa to join the artistic creation of Schweigen Impossible as a choreographer and performer. In 2018, coproduced by ID Festival, Berlin, and in collaboration with Theater Thikwa, Berlin, Science of Sign II: Oráculo premiered at Ballhaus Ost Berlin. On that year Gal also started a collaboration with theater director, Michaela Casper and the Possible World Deaf Ensemble and together they created a Sign Language interpretation to Shakespeare’s play A Midsummer Night Dream. Gal was invited to be one of the Sign Language actors and together with his partner in The progressive wave, Matan Zamir, they choreographed the piece with the Deaf actors using Sign Language and body language. Later on that year Gal was invited by choreographer Shiran Eliaserov as a dramaturge for her creation Beyond Control presented at ParochialKirche Berlin, and by Karolin Stächele as a dramaturge for her dance creation Myth. Gal is also teaching workshops and classes which revolve around the study of consciousness in relation to the moving body.