Esther Freixa i Ràfols
In 2005 obtains a Drama degree at the Theatre Institute of Barcelona. From 2006 to 2009 she continues her professional training taking part in different workshops lead by Kari Margolis, The South Wing, Rene Baker, Omnibus, Mal Pelo, Steve Paxton, Lisa Nelson, KiM (Kosmos in Movement). Between 2010 and 2012 she trains regularly Body Weather with Andrés Corchero-Rosa Muñoz, and Bio-voice with Víctor Turull, with whom in 2015 she deepens her research with the work ‘The voice body’. Since 2012 she is traveling to the south of India to learn the martial art Kalaripayattu at the Hindustan Kalari Sangam and Kalarigram.
She has been performing with Jill Greenhalgh, Fura dels Baus, Dulce Compañía, Meg Stuart, Roger Sala Reyner, La Reial and Diana Gadish, showing her work in England, Berlin, Amsterdam and Spain.
From 2007 she collaborates with the actor, researcher and director Toni Cots taking part between 2011 and 2015 in the laboratory Residual memory and collaborative practices. With him has created both the solo Medea (a la carta) which since 2009 has been presented 144 times in Spain, Mexico, Lebanon, Venezuela, Italy, Germany, and Argentina; and 30 years, a poetic act of resistence that since 2014 has been presented as a working-process to the audience in Mexico and Catalonia, and was premiered in 2017 and it’s been presented till today.
Also she does artistic coaching for different theatre and dance makers, such us Núria Guiu and Estitxu Arroyo. Teaches regularly classes, workshops and courses, and applies her research in individual sessions, depending on the needs of each person. Since 2016 she has collaborated with the coach Lourdes Gironès and her project Transformarte, designing body and voice sessions to integrate the lessons learned.
Between 2006 and 2010 is a member of La Bombeta, a non-profit cultural association which aim is to ensure links and relations between live artistic work and an audience. Between 2008 and 2010 co-directs and manages La Serradora, a working space run by a city council, dedicated to the Performing Arts research and practice. Since 2011 she is a funding member of the non-profit artistic association CRA’P. All these spaces based in Mollet del Vallès (Barcelona), her city of birth.
Toni Cots
Is a Performing Arts’ researcher, actor, maker and director.
Is a founding member of Cra’p – Artistic research and creation practices (http://www.cra-p.org/?lang=en).
Between 1975 and 1985 he is an actor and a member of Odin Theatre, Denmark, and I.S.T.A. (International School of Theatre Anthropology. Contemporaneously he studies and trains in theatre, dance and martial art forms from several Asian countries in India, Bali and Japan.
Between 1994 and 2002, he coordinates, creates and/or directs in Denmark and Scandinavia international cultural projects related to migration and exile in different countries.
Between 2001 and 2010 he is artistic co-director and coordinator of the creation centre ‘L’animal a l’esquena’ (http://www.lanimal.org), Celrà, Girona, Spain. He has been a driving force and the director of the ‘Master in Contemporary Arts Practice & Dissemination – MACAPD’ from 2007 to 2010 in collaboration with the University of Girona and other institutions from Slovenia and England.
In 2017 start the public presentations of a new piece, ’30 years – a poetic act of resistance’ (https://www.treintaños.org/en/) interpreted by Esther Freixa, and based on the different novels and poetry of Ingeborg Bachmann.
Between 2015 and 2018 he coordinates, within the framework of Interarts Foundation, the cultural and development Project ‘SouthMed CV’ (www.smedcv.net) in seven Southern Mediterranean countries ; and the project LAIC (Culture and Arts in support for the social cohesion in Latin-American cities) (http://www.fomecc.org/laic-noticias ), both funded by the EU Development Agency.
Editor of the book Loving Effects, published by Quodlibet, October 2011, related to the Euro-Mediterranean project ‘Miniatures’, (http://www.cra-p.org/?page_id=1716&lang=en).
Editor of the book ‘Mahattat’, published in April 2018 within the framework of the SouthMed CV project (http://www.smedcv.net/publications/).
Between 1997 and 2019 is a member of the editorial board of the Journal Performance Research (Routledge, UK).
He has worked and led courses and workshops in Denmark, Spain, France, Italy, Slovenia, Venezuela, Colombia, Peru, Ecuador, Brazil, Chile, Mexico, Lebanon, Egypt, Tunisia, among others.