Luiza Braz Batista is an nonbinary interdisciplinary artist, working mainly as a choreographer, performer, singer, curator and director. Born in Vitória, Brazil, Luiza began the career as a dancer at a young age in the Grupo de Dança Primeiro Ato, in Belo Horizonte, Brazil. Already at age 16, the artist received its first awards as a choreographer. At 19, it finished its master degree in Dance at the Folkwang Universität der Künste in Essen, Germany, and from 2009 to 2015 it worked at the Folkwang Tanzstudio dance company, also in Essen. Since 2008 Luiza is a guest dancer of the Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch and, since 2024, also a rehearsal director, responsible for staging Pina's pieces. Luiza was soloist of Susanne Linke's "Frauenballett", Pina Bausch's "Wind von West", "Zweiter Frühling" and "Orpheus and Eurydice" and worked with renowned choreographers, directors and collectives such as Emanuel Gat, Maura Morales, David Hernandez, Suely Machado, Moya Michael, Hannes Langolf, Lucyna Zwolinska, Futur II Konjunktiv and Urs Dietrich. From September 2015 to July 2018, Luiza was a member of the Dance Ensemble of the Theater Trier, in Trier, Germany, under the direction of Susanne Linke. From August 2018 till July 2022 worked as a member of the Acting Ensemble of Theater Trier. Currently Luiza works freelance, creating a cultural bridge between continents, developing own works, curating festivals and performing with diverse dance, theatre and performance companies and collectives worldwide.
Since 2010, Luiza has been cooperating with Susanne Linke and has been taking part in the development of Susanne´s dance technique INNER SUSPENSION. Since then, Luiza has been also teaching "Modern Dance Technique", "Movement Awareness", "Tap Dance" and "Improvisation".
Luiza has been improvising since the childhood and therefore always felt deeply attracted to improvisation as a performance form. Since 2008 Luiza has been cooperating with the painter/dancer/performer Milton Camilo and has been constructing a solid work of performances, installations and exhibitions of improvisational base. Since 2014 Luiza has been developing a music/dance improvisation project together with malaysian multi-artist Ng Chor Guan.
Luiza is also a writer. Among poems and a note´s blog (http://meucadernodeflores.blogspot.de/), the artist has had one of its texts published in the book "Tausend Bilder und eins: Comic als ästhetische Praxis in der postmigrantischen Gesellschaft", by Angela Weber & Katharina Moritzen - transcript Verlag.
SELECTED PRESS:
The Guardian
Opus - Kulturmagazin
Tanzweb
O Tempo
Trierischer Volksfreund