What do we women artists want to talk about?
In the month of March, the world turns its gaze towards the importance of making women visible, of commemorating their resonant voices that perpetuate beyond time and discourses.
In this brief space, we give the word to them, to these great artists who share with us a little about their trajectories and perspectives in relation to the Performing Arts. How have their paths been and what do them consider important to share at this time?
Luisa Huertas (Mexico)
With a trajectory of more than 40 years, Luisa says that her path has had difficult moments but also luminous moments, full of joy, full of creativity, recognition, rigor, hard work, but that it has always been worth it to do what she enjoys the most: acting.
"I believe that through art, humanity has known the spirit of human beings from different times, perhaps with different problems, but that always revolve around the same themes: love, hate, war, the construction of peace, poverty, wealth, inequality, injustice."
She considers that "art does not provide solutions, but it allows us to reflect". One of the most important characteristics of an artist is "respect and consideration for the other, seeing the other as equal, and also understanding the difference." Being a woman in the theater means respecting herself, contributing her sensitivity, the feminine gaze, the care, the details, the rigor, the organization, the pace of work.
"We women have had to fight to make our way, to show that we have the talent to do theater and to take on any role in the world of theater. And let us always look for harmony. Harmony is achieved with notes that are very different from each other, but that together make up harmonies."
Viviana Perea (Argentina)
Viviana has worked in the theater for around 25 years and comments that she continues to review speeches, working on what is happening on a day-to-day basis and feels that she still has a lot to learn. "To be able to live in art, depending on what we have chosen, to be coherent, to think and link ourselves from there, from that decision to make art a way of life."
For her, the key lies in the bonds that we create and nurture, that we do not detach ourselves from reality and that we always try to make others, minorities, social struggles and the achievements that we have as women visible.
"I really believe in the bond, in how we do theater from relationships. Theater is a purely group activity and we need to accompany the process of the other."
As a director, actress and manager of an International Women's Festival, she knows how important it is to network and share what we do. And it takes a lot of commitment, work, connection and support between everyone.
"We have to be responsible for what we communicate, for the discourses we hold, for the images we project. I always think of that spectator who goes to the theater for the first time. What do I offer to that spectator and who runs the risk of not coming back."
Angela Ribeiro (Brazil)
Angela confesses that it is always when she talks about her career that she realizes how great it is, as a woman who crossed Brazilian territory from Pará (northern Brazil) to São Paulo. She tells that she always wrote a lot in collaborative theater groups, and that later, as she wrote more alone, she found her identity as a playwright.
At the School of Dramatic Art, she began to discover her characteristics as an actress, as a creator, and among so many references, she managed to identify what was hers, legitimate, and what made her happy.
"As incredible as she may seem, we still carry the prejudices of a macho, patriarchal world, of needing validation somewhere unconscious and difficult to transform."
In the midst of everything, Angela is the mother of two children (Joaquim and Bento), and she shares with us that they are: her greatest work of art. Her children moved her gaze towards that place of maternity, of the feminine and of "how hard it is to perceive that we still need to dig our spaces with our nails".
"As an artist, my desire is to expand society's gaze, transform my concerns into poetry, into a tool for action in the world. The word cannot be just the word, it has to be action in the world."
Her constant search is to look at what she writes and see how she acts in the society in which she lives, how she becomes an element of transformation, how she raises her children to be agents of action - "understanding their upbringing and their time, but teaching them to have a human gaze also towards the feminine".
"We know what it's like to be silenced or men thinking that they have to put subtitles to what we say. We are in that transformation movement, but there are things that are still deeply rooted and only together can we make change happen."
Blanca Oteyza (Spain)
Blanca is an optimist. She shares with us that her path has been exciting, and that from a very young age she began to do and form her own projects. According to her, the best thing that can happen to an actress or actor is to have her head and her creativity always busy, because the artistic fact can save you from everything.
"I believe very much in work, in the rigor of work. You must never stop. I have seen many actors and actresses with very sad lives for suffering this call that never came. There will always be many difficulties but you must not throw away the towel."
For Blanca, the most important thing is the partner, putting herself in the place of the other, in the place of the character, honesty, preserving a low ego and a lot of camaraderie. "Egos confuse us and we must bear in mind that today you are there and tomorrow you are in another place."
Whether you are a woman or a man, the important thing is that there is passion, good work, honesty, struggle, rigor and faith in what one does from the heart, so the bad times will pass, but the satisfaction of being consistent with oneself is something that you do not like. no one will give it
For her, "when the illusion dies, the actor and the actress dry up. They begin to imitate, they become lazy, they stop investigating, they stop being excited, then one begins to wither." And she defends that artists do not work with lies, we work from the inside out to transmit it and to tell it, it is the truth.
"You can achieve it, you can live life as you want to live it because it is yours and you can share it with whoever you want, with whomever you love and with whomever you choose. I do not believe in individualism. I am a soul of company, a soul of believing in the love, a soul to share. I am an actress and when it comes to going on stage, what I look for is that: sharing."