Lia Rodrigues

Lia Rodrigues was born in 1956 in São Paulo, where she studied classical ballet and History at the University of São Paolo. She took part in São Paolo's contemporary dance movement in the 1970s and was in Maguy Marin's company from 1980 to 1982. In 1990 she set up the Lia Rodrigues Companhia de Danças in Rio de Janeiro, in 1992, the Panorama Festival. Since 2004, her company has been involved in developing educational and artistic initiatives in the Favela de Maré in Rio de Janeiro. The result is the Centro de Artes da Maré (Maré Arts Centre), which opened in 2009, and the Escola livre de Danças da Maré (Maré Free School of Dance), which opened in 2011.

During all the years of professional and artistic life, Lia Rodrigues has devoted herself not only to training and artistic creation, but also to teaching in the form of workshops and seminars. Combining militancy and utopianism, she believes in the synergy between art and social processes.

She has been awarded the Chevalier de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres medal by the French government, the Prince Claus Award from the Netherlands and the Prix Chorégraphie from the SACD. Rodrigues was voted as best choreographer of the year by Tanz Magazine in 2019 and received the Dance Critics' Prize as Choreographic Personality in 2020. In 2022, she was awarded the medal of Officier de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by the French government. 

In France, she created one of the Fables à la Fontaine in 2005 and Hymnen for the CCN ballet de Lorraine in 2007. In 2021 Rodrigues created “Encantado”. Lia Rodrigues is an associate artist of Centquatre-Paris.

Photo: Sammi Landweer