Mar Mordente (they/them)
is an artist based between Rio de Janeiro (Brazil), Oaxaca (México), and Chão do Rio, (Portugal). They are dedicated to poetic creations that draw from performance art, theatre, somatic practices, radical pedagogies, and ancestral medicines. Mar listens to Seismic Dreamings, and studies dreaming as a cosmopolitical field of creation and relation. Through processes of (un)learning with and dialogue across Indigenous feminist communities, transfeminisms, and counter-colonial movements, Mar collaborates with initiatives that interweave art, activism, and queer ecologies within transterritorial networks of collective re-existence and care.
Mar received the AMEXCID Artistic Creation Grant in Oaxaca, Mexico, where they researched the relationships between art, collective repair, and practices of sanación política. They later participated in The Artists Residency in Tel Aviv, developing performances in collaboration with anti-apartheid movements. They co-directed A Bird Is Not a Stone, nominated for the Shell Award for Best Direction. Their practice also unfolds through residencies developed in collaboration with the international collective Gesturing Towards Decolonial Futures (GTDF).
Mar holds an MA in Performing Arts from the University of Brasília (PPGCEN), postgraduate studies in Body Therapies from Angel Vianna College, and a BA in Theatre and Performance Studies from the Federal University of the State of Rio de Janeiro (UNIRIO). Over the years, they have presented their work in institutional and autonomous contexts across Europe, Abya Yala, and the Middle East.
@mar_mordente
EDUCATION
• [2023] MASTER IN THEATER AND PERFORMING ARTS | Brasilia University (UNB) | Brasilia-BR
• [2022] DEGREE IN TRE | Trauma Releasing Exercises
• [2016- ] STUDENT OF TRADITIONAL ZAPOTEC MEDICINE | with the master Alejandria Herrera | Oaxaca-MX
• [2014] POST-GRADUATE DEGREE IN BODY THERAPIES | Angel Vianna Faculty (FAV) | Rio de Janeiro-BR
• [2011] BACHELOR ON THEATRE AND PERFORMING ARTS | State of Rio de Janeiro University (UNIRIO)
• [2010] ART AND RESISTANCE PROGRAM | Hemispheric Institute (NYU) | San Cristóbal de Las Casa-MX
• [2010] PARQUE LAGE | Visual Arts School | Rio de Janeiro-BR
PERFORMANCE AND THEATER PROJECTS
• [2023-206] FROM MY MOTHERS´ THROAT | Performance | presented in:
❖ Exhibition A Place Where Secrets Have Been Told, curator Nicole Weniger (Innsbruck-AT)
❖ Festival Restos, Festival, Co-lab Perereka (Rio de Janeiro-BR)
• [2023-2026] A BIRD IS NOT A STONE | Theater Play | Carioca Development Program | presented in:
❖ Theatrical Season in Sérgio Porto Theatre (Rio de Janeiro-BR)
❖ Theatrical Season in Ipanema Theatre (Rio de Janeiro-BR)
❖ 30th Conference on Psychological Performance Studies (Fortaleza-BR)
• [2019-2024] DYBBUK: LET IT FALL | Artistic Research | The Artist’s Residency & House of Solidarity | Tel Aviv-IS
• [2016-2022] CHANGE SKIN LIKE A SERPENT | Artistic Research | presented in:
❖ MIC-International Cabaret Festival, Curitiba-BR & Cabaret Nights (Rio de Janeiro-BR) ❖ Agua que Corre - Memoria Viva de Mujeres en Oaxaca Exhibition, Galería Shinzaburo Takeda (Oaxaca-MX)
❖ EITAI Festival, International Encounter Theater, Alternatives and Research (Querétaro- MX)
❖ III Journey of the Asemblea de la Diversidad Sexual Oaxaqueña (Oaxaca-MX)
❖ National Encounter of Theater and Arts CODEDI-Committee for the Defense of Indigenous People (Santa Maria Huatulco-MX) ❖ FILMUFE-International Book Fair Feminisms and Women’s Studies (Oaxaca-MX)
❖ CompArte por la Humanidad, Arts Festival of the Zapatista National Liberation Army (Chiapas-MX)
❖ Diversity Muxe Week (Juchitán de Zaragoza-MX)
• [2018-2020] OHDIOSA VENUS DE LA INCIERTA FUTURA | Asamblea de la Divesidad Oaxaqueña:
❖ Libre Espacio La Jícara (Oaxaca-MX)
❖ LesViernes; Punto Gozadera (Mexico City-MX)
❖ National Theater Show (Oaxaca-MX)
❖ El Ocote (Juchitán de Zaragoza-MX) [2012-2014] NEO-MITHOS | Artistic Research | presented in:
❖ Nuvem HackLab Rural (Visconde de Mauá-BR)
❖ Hangar Residency (Barcelona-ES)III Journey of the Asemblea de la Diversidad Sexual Oaxaqueña (Oaxaca-MX)
• [2011-2016] “B-T-G P-T-1-5-0-5-9-CÂMBIO” | Theatre of Operations | presented in:
❖ Festival Corpo SubCorpo, SESC de Santos (São Paulo-BR)
❖ Seminar of the Research Group Aesthetic-Political Practices in Contemporary Art, University of Rio das Ostras (Rio de Janeiro-BR)
❖ Intercom, II Biennial of International Theater at the University of São Paulo (São Paulo-BR)
❖ Panorama Dance Festival (Rio de Janeiro-BR)
• [2009-2013] THE SCENE IS PUBLIC | Theatre of Operations | presented in:
❖ Eighth Hemispheric Institute Meeting (São Paulo-BR)
❖ Truth is Concrete Festival (Graz-AT)
❖ Rio+20 (Rio de Janeiro-BRl)
❖ São Luís do Maranhão Street Theatre Festival (Maranhão-BR)
• [2011] DEVENIR PERRA| PornoPorsi Festival (Buenos Aires-AR)
• [2010] NO+ MATANZAS | Hemispheric Institute (San Cristóbal de Las Casas-MX) PEDAGOGICAL PROPOSITIONS
• [2026] IN THE DREAMING SPIRAL in partnership with Angie Donini
❖ Nise da Silveira Institute and UNIRIO (Rio de Janeiro, BR)
• [2023-2026] SEISMIC DREAMING
❖ Bastard Festival (Trondheim, NO)
❖ Cascadas Gallery (Barcelona, ES)
❖ Penhasco Cooperativa (Lisbon, PT)
❖ Casa das Heras (Nova Friburgo, Brasil)
• [2023-2026] TWILIGHT PRACTICES in partnership with Dani d'Emilia
❖ Gulbenkian Foundation (Lisbon, PT)
❖ Rumo do Fumo (Lisbon, PT)
❖ Regeneration Festival (Duesseldorf, DE)
❖ Almada Gallery (Almada, PT)
• [2022-2023] CASA CONJURO | Online Hub for Restorative Practices
• [2019] SELF-CARE/SELF-DEFENSE PRACTICES | II Kefir Digital Security Journeys | Anomaly Galery & El Ocote (Oaxaca-MX)
• [2011-2015] PERIPHERAL PEDAGOGIES | Theatre of Operations project in the favela Vila Cruzeiro ( Rio de Janeiro-BR)
• [2010-2012] CIRCULANDO PROJECT | Meeting with Autists University of Rio de Janeiro (Rio de Janeiro-BR) ARTISTIC RESIDENCIES • [2026] PROGRAMA PRACTICA | Performing Arts Mentorship Program | online residency
• [2025-2026] METABOLIZING HUMANS WRONGS | Gesturing Towards Decolonial Futures Collective
• [2024] REACTIVATING EXILED CAPACITIES | Gesturing Towards Decolonial Futures Collective
• [2023] THE ARTIST’S RESIDENCE | Herzlyia-IS
• [2018] LXS PROXIMXS PROJECT| Oaxaca-MX
• [2015-2016] BONOBANDO AND THE LAJE THEATER| Cultural Center Arena Dicró | Rio de Janeiro-BR
• [2013] HANGAR| Barcelona-ES
• [2012-2013] NUVEM RURAL HACKLAB | Visconde de Mauá-BR
• [2018] LA RICA RESIDENCIA| PornoPorsi Festival | Buenos Aires-AR
PUBLICATIONS
• [2025-2026] SEISMIC DREAMING BOOK | Gesturing Towards Decolonial Futures Collective & Musagetes Foundation
• [2025] Reactivating Exiled Capacities (REC)- Telluric Dreaming | Artseverywhere
• [2025] UNLEARNING GENOCIDE| Ecoversitie Magazine
• [2023] VIBRATONAL muDANÇAS: heart spells at the boundaries between dreams, performance, and vastness | Master’s Dissertation (Performing Arts Program/UnB)
• [2022] DYBBUK- Let it Fall | Art Forum
• [2022] TELLURIC DREAMING- Art-life Rituals for Radical Tennderness| Artseverywhere
• [2022] DYBBUK- Let it Fall | Art Forum
• [2022] INTERVIEW WITH JOÃO VICENTE about the play “The Lighthouse Island”| Aspas Magazine-USP
PRIZES
• [2025] SHELL THEATRE AWARD | nominated Best Director Category for the play “A Bird is not a Stone”.
• [2016] AMEXCID | Prize Scholarship for Foreigners Artists in Mexico
• [2015] RIO DE JANEIRO GOVERNMENT FUND | Art Festival Monstra de Artes Vila Cruzeiro| Rio de Janeiro-RJ
• [2011] UNIRIO PRIZE | University of Rio de Janeiro’s Academic Research Prize for the investigation about relationship between theater and politics
• [2010] SPECIAL PRIZE JURY | Revelation Actres | National Festival of Ponta Grossa-BR
• [2010] AWARD FOR BEST ACTRESS | FESTGUAÇU - Guaçuí National Theater Festival-BR
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