On November 21, Filipa Francisco held two sessions of the Escola Futurama ‘What It Takes?’, bringing her sensory workshop to the Senior University of Beja.
This workshop was born from the desire to share improvisation practices developed in participatory artistic projects, exploring the repertoire of traditional music and dance, in dialogue with contemporary dance, to discover new scores and connections between individual and collective imagination.
Biography
Filipa Francisco believes that dance can be a driver of change, and for this reason, she has developed several projects in collaboration with different communities, where it has been possible to carry out intensive work questioning the relationship between art and life. She studied Dance, Theatre, Improvisation, and Dramaturgy at the Escola Superior de Dança, with the Trisha Brown Dance Company, at the Lee Strasberg Institute in New York, and with the dramaturge André Lepecki.
She has worked with choreographers and directors Francisco Camacho, Vera Mantero, Sílvia Real, Madalena Vitorino, Rui Nunes, Aldara Bizarro, Paula Castro, Bruno Cochat, Lúcia Sigalho, João Garcia Miguel, and Joaquim Benite. She is a founding member of the Grupo Teatro Olho and, together with Bruno Cochat, of the company Cia Torneira, with which they created the piece “Nu Meio”, performed since 1996.
Among her works, she highlights the solos “Leitura de Listas” in collaboration with André Lepecki, “Dueto” co-created with the Basque choreographer Idoia Zabaleta, Partilhas/Exchanges in collaboration with Eleonora Fabião, and Para onde Vamos? co-created with António Pedro. These performances have been presented at various festivals in Portugal and abroad and continue to tour.
In 2007, she was a guest artist in the “Reinsertion through Art” project promoted by the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation in Educational Centers. She also worked with the El-Funoun – Palestinian Traditional Dance Group, teaching a Contemporary Dance workshop alongside choreographer Carlos Pez.
Among her participatory art projects, particularly in the areas of training, research, creation, presentation, and touring, she highlights the development of a seven-year training program in Dance-Theatre and Creation with inmates at the Castelo Branco Prison (Reexistir Project).
She also worked on the project “Nu Kre bai bu onda” (2007–2010), focused on Dance and Artistic Creation training in the Cova da Moura neighborhood. As part of this project, she presented the piece “Íman” at the Belém Cultural Center during the Alkantara Festival. The piece received critical acclaim and was considered by the newspaper Público as the “best Dance performance of 2008.” Additionally, the project “A Viagem” with Folklore Groups premiered in Guimarães, European Capital of Culture, and toured Portugal, Wales, and Brazil (2011–2025…).
She is the artistic director of the association Mundo em Reboliço. She is also part of the groups Periferias Centrais and REDE, as well as the international network AREA.
