PLAN B

Episode #2: Challenges for the Performing Arts: Voices from Latin America 2

The discussion continues to address some of the topics from the KITCHEN TALK #1 and give an overview of new possibilities in the Performing Arts as well as discuss the challenges in maintaining exchanges and networks and developing projects in a pandemic context from the perspective of Latin American women working in the cultural field.
Carla Estefan graduated in Performing Arts and Cultural Production. Since 2002 she has directed Metropolitana Gestão Cultural, an agency for management, production and distribution of contemporary Performing Arts. For 12 years, she managed the production of several award-winning projects and plays by Brazilian artists and theatre companies that toured nationally and internationally. Since 2014, her work has mainly focused on promoting Brazilian theater worldwide, collaborating in the implementation of national initiatives such as MTbr-Brazilian Platform and BCA Encounter, presenting associated artists to the international network, creating opportunities for artistic residencies, co-productions and touring, coordinating workshops and participating in discussion panels on curation and internationalization of the Latin American performing scene. In 2020, during the pandemic, Carla started Sala Aberta #REC (Open Room #REC), an independent project that began under the premise of social isolation and aimed to reconnect artists and audiences during confinement to explore new possibilities for artistic expression in the digital world.
Nayse Lopez is a journalist, scriptwriter and performing arts curator. Since 2001, she also became curator and general director of Panorama, one of the biggest performing arts festivals in Brazil, where she developed several expertise in curating and organizing small and large events with international guests. In 2018, she was one of the curators and artistic directors of the project riofestiv.al, the first entirely online arts festival in Brazil, where different new formats of online artistic presence were created, including the live streaming of six performances. In 2020, she directed the project Panorama Luto, a live tribute to the victims of Covid-19 in Brazil that lasted 51h live on YouTube and brought together more than 300 artists, activists and people of all professions, from Alto Xingu to Stockholm, reading texts about mourning, hope, solidarity, art and freedom. In 2021, she took on the artistic direction of the international platform Panorama Raft, which will create 10 unreleased performances created to be seen online in pandemic times. 
Vera Garat is a choreographer, teacher and contemporary dance performer. Graduate in Visual Arts, Master in Art and Visual Culture, IENBA, UdelaR. Specialist in Artistic Education, Culture and Citizenship, Center for Higher University Studies, CAEU, OEI. Co - Director of the Artists in Residence PAR – Initiative that aim to support and promote research and creation in contemporary performing arts. The program is committed to the creation of a network of artists and national and foreign institutions to energize the local environment and promote the development of culture in Uruguay, created in 2010  and Co - Director of the International Contemporary Dance Festival of Uruguay FIDCU.
Shoshana Polanco is a creative producer with international exposure and work experience in Buenos Aires, New York, and Mexico City. She has worked for major festivals such as the Cervantino in Mexico, FIBA in Buenos Aires, and TeatroStageFest and Lincoln Center Festival in NYC. As a consultant, she worked for Southern Exposure (Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation), Made in Scotland (Creative Scotland), Music Theatre Now (ITI Germany), Rolex Mentor and Protege Program (Rolex Foundation), CAPACOA (The Canadian Association for the Performing Arts), and The Fringe Society (Edinburgh) among others. In NYC she worked at BAM, PS122, Under the Radar, and The Builders Association. In Mexico, she works for La Teatrería and Teatrix MX developing new productions and long-term strategies for the company. She was part of the curatorial committee of festival ESCENICA in Mexico 2019 and she is currently a member of the curatorial committee for the Festival Internacional Cervantino. She is a mentor to young artists and producers in Buenos Aires at Incubadora / DGEART. Polanco is an ISPA board member and fellow grad. She holds a Magna Cum Laude BA from the CUNY Baccalaureate Program in Women in Performance.
Dianelis Diéguez is trained as a stage critic and researcher at the University of the Arts in Havana, she has worked mainly in the field of management and the activation of multidisciplinary projects and live arts. As part of the Laboratorio Escénico de Experimentación Social (LEES, 2012-2019) and the Osikán experimental scenic nursery (2016-2019), she encouraged the work of Cuban artists who focus on alternative creative practices and has been researching the notion of community within the sociability that emerges from the relations between neighbourhoods and artists. She is a member of the Vulnus Association. For the next two editions of the festival SÂLMON in Barcelona, which is embarking on a new cycle of shared curatorship, she will be in charge of artistic and organisational coordination.