Karen da Silva & Dora da Cruz  

@dr.karendasilva / www.karendasilva.com

@thexplorabydora / vimeo.com/150075037

Residency period: April – May 2022

Bio: Karen da Silva is a Portuguese/British independent dance artist.  She has performed in dance, theater and film and has choreographed a variety of works since 1994 with a focus on making site specific work. 

Dora da Cruz is a multidisciplinary arts practitioner. After living for a couple of years in the UK, she is now back in Portugal to continue developing her career as an actress. 

Residency purpose: Karen & Dora proposed for this residency to learn and develop their artistic ideas on a digital angle. In this new post-pandemic life they were struggling to remain artists and constantly find other means of survival. This residency with Arroz Estúdios and the integration with the NEAR ecosystem provided them the opportunity to connect, collaborate, support, train and integrate with international creatives. As experienced artists, but newcomers to Portugal, they were looking for a supportive creative environment in which they could begin to feel more oriented and integrated into an artistic community.

Outcome and involvement with NEAR – Protocol: 

Dora and Karen’s research project, “I’m from here / I’m not from here”, investigates this paradoxical space with which they (and so many of us) strongly identify. Through movement, dance and physical theater they are exploring the complexity of being Luso descendants who, having immigrated and then come back to their homeland, discover a sense of feeling foreign in their own country.

Karen da Silva created a site-specific choreography as her final work for the residency, documented in an interview and video.

Dora da Cruz did her first Women in Crypto Meet Up at Arroz Estúdios in July this year, bringing a female crowd to discuss cryptoart and projects developed by women in the crypto world.