cinema Arc-et-Senans

Thais de Almeida Prado/

Director and Actress

Thais de Almeida Prado

2019

Thaís de Almeida Prado is a filmmaker, multimedia artist and actor. She was born in 1981 in Belo Horizonte, Brazil, and moved to São Paulo at the age of two. She holds masters degrees in cinematographic studies and theatre direction from the University of São Paulo.

Thaís de Almeida Prado’s work occupies the meeting points between performance, dance, theatre, visual arts, cinema, music and literature.

In 2018, Thaís worked with Lucas Bambozzi on the video installation ‘Icamiaba-Beatnik’, part of the audiovisual project ‘Luz de 5ª’. Between 2015 and 2017 she spent time in Germany where, in collaboration with Bianca Mendonça and Katharina Geyer, she developed the dance project ‘Co2 and other Toxins’, inspired by the 2015 Mariana dam disaster in Brazil. In 2012, Thaís produced the short film ‘Os Barcos’ (The ships) with Caetano Gotardo, winner of the best short film prize at the Vitoria Festival and best screenplay at CineMUBE, Brazil. The same year, Thaís worked on the theatre pieces ‘Origem / Destino’, inspired by São Paulo’s 4,000 km of hidden waterways, ‘Entulho-Excesso’ and ‘Aparelhos de Superar Ausências’, an installation and performance piece. In 2007, Thaís completed the project ‘A adormecida que...’ for Peter Greenaway’s exhibition ‘Tulse Luper Suitcases’.

From 2008 to 2010, Thaís was part of the Collectif Corrosivo, joining them for artistic residencies at the Saline Royale d'Arc-et-Senans, where they developed the project ‘Les Chemins du Sel’ (a collection of short performances and an experimental video ‘Exercice du Regard’), in Barcelona, and at the Casa das Caldeiras in Brazil, where they carried out research on the history of the space to create the installation ‘Olhares entre Caldeiras’. Thaís has also been part of the theatre-dance company Auto-Retrato since 2002 and has taken part in numerous projects as an actor, dancer and director.

Project ‘Aller / Retour’

In November 2009, Thaís de Almeida Prado was artist in residence at the Saline Royale d'Arc-et-Senans, working with Carolina Bonfim from the Collectif Corrosivo. The aim was to produce a video based on memories of the town of Arc et Senans, through the use of official accounts from the bibliographic records of the CCR as well as audio and video testimonies from former workers and residents. Their research led the two artists to conclude that this was a ‘static’ town; people seemed not to move. A town of salt, created to process and work with salt. Thus, salt became the principal theme of the project and reminded the artists of the imaginary utopian town of Chaux, created by the Saline Royale’s architect Claude-Nicolas Ledoux, and which led them into a playful and fantastical world.

Ten years have passed since the residency and Thaís, feeling the need to reconnect the past with the present, came back to the site to further explore her ‘memories of salt’. The project ‘Aller / Retour’ is a video installation contrasting newly created images with the materials produced ten years ago.