In the carpet of weaving politics and magic

A person very close to me one day told me that what I was doing was to weave. As if I took many things that apparently don't intersect, and gave them a shape, I took it, and I liked it. I feel like three things happen with this: sometimes the form is identifiable and enters into a system we recognise, sometimes the form becomes visionary and íi feels like I'm creating something revolutionary, sometimes the form doesn't resemble anything and becomes confusing. I even like this one. 

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Piny Orchidaceae 

A human being who doesn't believe in borders drawn on paper. Bom in Lisbon, with roots in Portugal and Angola. Performer, choreographer, researcher, teacher, intersectional feminist and activist. 

In 1999, she began studying North African dances and their contemporary fusions and, since 2006, she has dedicated, in parallel, to street and clubbing culture (Breakdance, House, Waacking, Vogue). In 2006, co-founded the female crew ButterflieSou/Flow (Breaking and Dj), in 2012 the collective Orchidaceae and in 2019 the collective Vogue PT Chapter. She has been teaching nationally since 2008, and since 2014, she has taught at international festivals in Europe, Asia, America and Africa. Graduated in architecture with a post-graduation in scenography in 2009, and in Contemporary Dance in 2012. She collaborated with different choreographers and from her artistic work she highlights the work with her collective Orchidaceae and the pieces "Hf P a pussy point of view'', "Periférico· (in collaboratíon with Vhíls), ".G RITO" and "ONYX". She finished the course "Immersion in Afrícan Phílosophies" by Kaliuscia Ribeiro and continuously studies Hatha Yoga, Advaila Vedanta, Astrology and Tarot. She created and curated OU.kupa, a festival/celebration in Lisbon, dedicated to street and clubbing dances. 

No tapete there are landscapes

On the carpet...

there are landscapes 

there are calm landscapes,

desolate.

On the carpet...

there are spiral landscapes

where pleasure haunts

where you go around

and you don't return to the same place.

On the carpet...

there are landscapes of a time

that drains slowly

almost motionless

or in retreat

On the carpet...

there are landscapes like a bed sheet

pulled up to the head,

of lacerated nerves

or ‘saudades’.

On the carpet

there are landscapes.

From a poem by Henri Michaux

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Daniela Cruz is a choreographer, a dancer and a contemporary dance trainer. She completed the vocational course at the Ginasiano dance school. She graduated at Codarts (Rotterdam) in 2003 and interned at the Krisztina de Châtel dance company (Amsterdam). She works as a freelancer and has performed for Marco da Silva Ferreira, Victor Hugo Pontes, Cristina Planas Leitão, André Braga and Cláudia Figueiredo/Circolando, Joana Providência, Madalena Victorino, Nuno M Cardoso, Nuno Preto, Jonathan Saldanha, Catarina Miranda, and Sofia Dias and Vítor Roriz. She was a choreography and rehearsal assistant at Companhia Instável, where she was also artistic coordinator of the FAÍCC (a program for performers and choreographers) and of the FOCAR (a program that combines Choreography and Architecture). She worked as movement director for Teatro Art'Imagem and Teatro do Bolhão, and she created pieces for K2, the CITAC, Kale Companhia de Dança, Casa da Arquitectura (via Companhia Instável) and Companhia Presente (Viseu). She co-created several projects for young audiences together with Nuno Preto. She is co-artistic director in several participatory projects, involving the community in the scope of the projects Aldear and Odisseia Nacional, both managed by Luís Sousa Ferreira. Her latest creations, dalila and ocelo, were co-produced by Teatro Municipal do Porto. She takes part of Colectivo Espaço Invisível, since 2017. 

What Do You Want Me to Say?

Between flamenco, voice, and body — between motherhood, exhaustion, and the urge to create — this artist invites the audience into a scenic game: improvised, intimate, and unapologetic.

A kind of contemporary oracle where each spectator decides what they want to see, hear, or know:

— What do you want me to say?

— What do you want me to sing?

— What do you want me to confess?

What I don’t know, I invent. What I can’t do, I dance.

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Mercedes Quijada (Granada, 1991) is a choreographer, dancer, and artist. Her artistic career intersects contemporary dance, flamenco, and visual arts, with a special focus on the physicality and traditional female figure within Andalusian folklore.

Graduated in Contemporary Dance from the Reina Sofía Professional Dance Conservatory (Granada) and Oficina Zero (Porto), she began her flamenco career with masters Manolete and Mariquilla (2008-2015) and, since 2017, has been deepening her research into the world of improvisation. With a degree in Fine Arts and a postgraduate degree in Art Education, she has lived in Porto since 2019, where she researches the intersection of dance, visual arts, and the use of voice.

Currently, she works actively with Companhia Instável and choreographer Helder Seabra, as well as Companhia Arte Total, where she develops several creative and performance projects. She also continues to perform in BLUE, a contemporary circus show directed by Margarida Montenÿ. As a performer, she has collaborated with artists such as Eva la Yerbabuena, Victor Hugo Pontes, Mafalda Deville, Luísa Mota, Ania Catherine, and Dejna Ti.

As a creator and researcher, she is the author of the solos BESTA (2021) and A·Dentro (2023), as well as the pieces Entre la Pluma y la Pared (2021, with Sara Santervás) and 703 Sonhos (2022).

In 2023, she created the Perforartes program, a space for experimentation and dialogue between dance and visual arts, which continues to evolve and seek new forms of expression.

Like a knot in a carpet

Weaving, choreographing and writing are initially distinct gestures, but they are interconnected through movement and the way they form webs or wefts. Taking the context of the program “No Tapete” as a starting point, this performative conversation will be an exercise around articulations between these gestures, discussing their implications on the way we situate ourselves in reality and in artistic practice. The loom, the score and the page are sites of intertwining, where texture and meaning, difference and repetition, are subjected to permutations and transformations. How does the activity of weaving relate to a body or a choreographic process? How do you “weave” a text or a choreographic score? What if the body is the carpet, the object to be woven? How to weave relationships in a common space and time? We will also discuss how mistakes can become part of the process and how small accidents can redirect our attention, giving importance to things we are not used to noticing.

This performative conversation is part of the research project “Writing without an Alphabet”. This project is financed by national funds and the European Social Fund through the Foundation for Science and Technology.

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Joclécio Azevedo Brazil, 1969. Has lived in Porto since 1990. His work articulates different roles that writing can assume in artistic practice, as a gesture, material or instrument for recording performance. He was artistic director of the Núcleo de Experimentação Coreográfica between 2006 and 2011. He was a member of the plenary board of GDA (Cooperativa de Gestão dos Direitos dos Artistas) from 2008 to 2023 and a member of the Board of curators of the GDA Foundation between 2010 and 2017. He has been a resident artist at Circular Associação Cultural since 2012, having also coordinated the association's educational program between 2018 and 2023. Between 1991 and 1993, he was part of several creations by the Balleteatro Contemporâneo do Porto dance company. As a performer or choreographer, he participated in productions by BCN – Ballet Contemporâneo do Norte, between 2012 and 2021. He collaborated with several artistic training programs such as FAICC – Advanced training in interpretation and choreographic creation, by Companhia Instável, Oficina ZERO or Balleteatro Escola Profissional. In 2016, he worked as a guest assistant in the Performance Specialisation Course at FBAUP. From 2016 to 2018, he collaborated with the Sintoma – Performance, Research and Experimentation group, guided by Rita Castro Neves and developed by i2ADS at FBAUP. He is currently studying for a PhD in Contemporary Art at the College of Arts, University of Coimbra.