The artist’ collective Cuerpo Sur wants to offer young artists from Latin America a platform to share their stories. With the support of the DOEN Foundation, Cuerpo Sur organises intensive training programmes for young performing artists from Latin America. Giving them the opportunity to develop socially inclusive artistic practices to create perspectives for a better future. Avanzada Sur, the annual programme of artistic accompaniment, wants to create space for imagination.
Creating space for the imagination
Chile is characterised by enormous social inequality. The last few years have been marked by mass protests and a failed referendum. The country also faces several deplorable human rights problems, the partial criminalisation of abortion and the restriction of the rights of immigrants and refugees. The artists’ collective Cuerpo Sur offers young creators and local communities an opportunity to represent an alternative future through art. In doing so, the collective creates space for people and their stories, often stifled by the upper layers of society, going unnoticed and unheard. In this way, the collective generates a multitude of perspectives and greater polyphony.
The founders of Cuerpo Sur, theatre makers and directors Luis Guenel Soto and and Ebana Garín Coronel, hope to share their knowledge, tools and experience with communities that currently have little or no access to contemporary (performing) arts, but are open but are open to new experiences. In the past, for example, Luis has worked in different regions of the country developing territorial work with specific communities.
Developing socially oriented artistic practices
Under the guidance of experienced professionals and together with local communities, young theatre makers have the opportunity to create new works and engage with communities in culturally isolated territories. This is achieved through seminars, artistic research and residencies on the island of Chiloé-Patagonia and in the city of Valparaiso, where Cuerpo Sur has established a strong relationship with the local community. Participants are accompanied and guided for a year while they develop their socially oriented artistic practices. In early 2024, the work will be shown to a wide national and international audience in Santiago, the capital of Chile.
