Encuentro PT

Part academic conference, part performance festival, Encuentros are biennial events that bring together hundreds of scholars, artists, activists, and students at different sites in the Americas. Encuentros foster experimentation, dialogue, and collaboration through a program of lectures, performances, roundtables, work groups, workshops, street art actions, exhibitions, and cabaret.

  • Keynote Lectures

    Leading scholars and practitioners are invited to each Encuentro to give keynote lectures that conceptually frame our discussions, situate the Encuentro topic within specific social contexts, and expand the theoretical debates in the field.

  • Performances, Installations, and Visual Arts Exhibitions

    Encuentros feature a wide range of performances daily, as artists from the Americas share their work in theater, music, dance, performance art, street interventions, online actions, cabaret/bar acts, etc. Multimedia installations and visual arts are also presented, and many are exhibited for the duration of the Encuentro.

  • Work Groups

    Our work groups emerged as an alternative to traditional academic panels. In line with Hemi’s vision, work groups foster spaces for creative inquiry and critical practice around the themes of the event. A key component of our Encuentros, work group offerings reflect the diversity of our interdisciplinary constituencies, enabling dialogue and collaboration between scholars, artists, and activists. Instead of presenting individual papers, participants use their time together to approach the group topic through discussions and/or alternative performative methods.

  • Trasnocheo

    The Trasnocheo series offers a late-night performance venue for emerging and established artists to present short works or works in progress. The cabaret style creates a more relaxed atmosphere that encourages participation and experimentation.

  • Round Tables

    Round table discussions allow scholars, artists and activists to engage in diverse discussions with each other and with the Encuentro participants.

  • Long Tables

    Conceived by Lois Weaver, the Long Table experiments with participation and public engagement by reappropriating a dinner table atmosphere as a public forum, and encouraging informal conversations on serious topics. Anyone and everyone is welcome to come to the table, ask questions, make statements, leave comments on the paper table cloth, or simply sit, watch, and listen. Download the Long Table Etiquette here.

  • Workshops

    Invited artists offer hands-on performance workshops to our participants for three hours each morning. Workshops cover a large range of performance practices and the visual arts, such as dance, mask-making, solo performance techniques, capoeira, digital photography, online 'hacktivism', mural painting, etc.