By

DEBORAH

COLKER

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Cafi showed me Pernambuco. He was born in Recife, came to Rio, but continues a Pernambucan. Thanks to Cafi I learned about the work of Mestre Vitalino, Gilvan Samico, and, of course, João Cabral. “How so much thicker/ is the blood of a man/ than the dream of a man.” I was only 20. It was all very intense.                 

 

João Elias re-introduced me to O cão sem plumas. We were in one of these three hour Rio traffic jams, when he gave me a book with the poem. I started to read and to cry. Right there I decided it would be the next show. We saw caboclinho, cavalo-marinho, maracatu... We saw people, the Capibaribe, the mangroves. We filmed everything. 

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It is a spectacle of inconceivable things, which should never be permitted. It is against human ignorance. We destroy nature, children, everything that is full of life. I started the company concerned about the body and space. That was my target. After I found the language, I needed to deal with existential things – love, desire, affection. My history is a history of mixtures, Cão Sem Plumas includes the elegance of the classical, the mud of the roots and a contemporary vision. For me, the name for this is João Cabral.

 

I dedicate this spectacle to my grandson Theo, who is my helmsman, to his marvelous grandfather Totoi (Toni Platão) and eternally to my children, Clara and Miguel.

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