Helena Botto (PT/DE/UK) is a performer and maker working in between London and Berlin. She is a PhD candidate (start January 2019) at the School of Arts - Drama, Theatre and Performance - at University of Roehampton, in London to which she holds a fellowship from Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, from Portugal. In her practice-as-research thesis she has been exploring the performativity of acts of populist political rhetoric, ways of fictional writing, and the thinking of democracy as an ‘improper’, monstrous and dissonant space.
In 2015 she received her MA in Solo/Dance/Authorship (Distinction) from the Hochschulübergreifendes Zentrum Tanz Berlin (HZT) / Universität der Kunst Berlin (UDK). Her background is in physical theatre: methodology of physical actions, Jerzy Grotowski's art as vehicle. From 1997 – 2005, she performed and co-directed projects in Acto (PT) within this framework. In 2006, she started work as an independent artist developing her own performance work. She has presented work in Berlin (Uferstudios; Hau 2 - 100º), Portugal, Sofia (Antistatic Festival) and in the UK, also at academic conferences, such as TaPRA. She was awarded with Young Directors Scholarship/Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian (2008), Tanzstipendium/Berlin Senate (2015) and TANZallianz Scholarship/CC Heidelberg (2016), Karl Hofer Gesellschatf (2017), Goethe Institut (2017), etc. |
She led workshops in Portugal and abroad (support of Instituto Camões 2008/09), taught Movement Composition at Filmschauspielschule Berlin (2011-2018) and was a Visiting Lecturer at the University of Roehampton (Spring Term 2020).
She is currently a researcher in POPBACK, a Norface funded, interdisciplinary research project on the effects of exclusionary populism, and part of 'Queer Feminist Currents', a two-years Techné Conflux funded research events. She worked with Iva Sveshtarova as a dramaturgical consultant. |