ABOUT ME
Brazilian-Canadian
Community-Engaged Artist & Educator
I am a Brazilian-Canadian community-engaged artist and educator dedicated to bridging literary and performing arts with social and environmental sustainability.
In 2020, I created an intergenerational creative writing program, Roots & Seeds, for youth across BC. This program was developed in partnership with Sierra Club BC, and is now available to Grades 6-9 Language Arts educators interested in incorporating environmental topics into their classrooms.
I have managed creative writing programs and taught speech and drama at the Bolton Academy of Spoken Arts in Vancouver, taught theatre and directed productions across a number of Montreal stages, and currently lead creative writing and spoken word workshops with youth at DAREarts.
When I'm not teaching, I enjoy exploring my own writing. In 2019, I was a writer-in-residence at the Gullkistan Centre for Creativity in Iceland, where I developed poetry on environmental degradation. I later performed my poetry at the 2019 Vancouver Outsider Art Festival. Selected as a 2019 BC Culture Days Ambassador, I also shared my work through a community-engaged art installation, A Poetic Landscape.
With a BFA from Concordia University and as a current UBC MEd student, focusing on Education for Sustainability, I am curious about the intersections between the arts, education, and sustainability.
ROOTS & SEEDS
A Creative Writing Program at Sierra Club BC
This program is focused on facilitating opportunities for intergenerational and province-wide connections. Participants develop oral and written storytelling skills, and steward curiosity about plants and stories of their connection to place. Throughout the program, youth participants (Grades 6-10) reach out to older adults (age 50+) who they are already acquainted with, and exchange personal stories about plants and place – from tree-climbing adventures to forest foraging to gardening mishaps and celebrations.
Resources for this program are now available to BC Language Arts teachers interested in broaching environmental topics in their classrooms. Educators can choose to follow the seven session course outlined in the resources, or explore individual activities at their own pace as they see fit for their students.
The program is designed to help students improve the following skills:
- Interviewing and story gathering
- Researching
- Oral storytelling
- Written composition (nonfiction, fiction, and poetry)
- Editing
- Presenting
Optional: If instructors are interested in challenging their students to explore publication and community storytelling, the course can culminate in a dynamic manuscript. See an example of this, Roots & Seeds: A Sierra Club BC Student Writing Chapbook, by following the link below.
VICTORIA-FRASERVIEW STORIES
A Neighbourhood Placemaking Project, 2020
In collaboration with the City of Vancouver and the South Vancouver Neighbourhood House, I am working with a team of UBC researchers and social innovators to enhance the Victoria-Fraserview neighbourhood through a project that celebrates its residents' experiences through visual storytelling. If you're a resident from the Victoria-Fraserview neighbourhood in South Vancouver, we'd love to hear your story!
A POETIC LANDSCAPE
An Interactive Installation at BC Culture Days, 2019
In A Poetic Landscape, Culture Days festival participants were invited to reflect on how the landscape surrounding Vancouver citizens could impact their thinking.
Through a reflective park installation, participants read landscape-inspired poetry, practiced the art of natural observation, and responded with written reflections, which connecting observations from members of the Vancouver community!
A TRILOGY OF ARCTIC SUMMER NIGHTS
A Poetry Collection, 2019
As a Writer-in-Residence at the Gullkistan Centre for Creativity (Iceland), I developed a collection of poems relating to themes of environmental degradation due to global warming.
I performed a selection of the poems at the 2019 Vancouver Outsider Art Festival representing the Vancouver Poetry House.
To read one of the poems in this collection, click the link below.
FUTURES/FORWARD
An Artistic Partnership, 2020
Every year the International Centre of Art for Social Change (ICASC) connects environmental artists across Canada with environmental organizations that need their creative support. In 2020, I participated in this program, and worked to enhance environmental education through arts-based approaches.
CONTACT
