Based on the unpublished text Invincible Armada by Maria da Graça Varella Cid, UMCOLETIVO brings together a league of women - a circus/circle of voices - to win over thirty spectators. Like nymphs, they sing to seduce the audience, to whom they speak of intimacy and war, describing a free city that is anchored in a metal prison.

Labour, liquidity and memory appear as concepts in the imagery we have created - of water, of the night - a feminine imagery that will take thirty spectators on an intimate journey.

After an artistic residency at the Casa da Cultura in Sacavém in October, we continued our process at home, in Portalegre, at the Cooperativa Operária Portalegrense, between the 9th and 13th of January. We premiere on 9 February at the São Luiz Municipal Theatre (Lisbon) and return to Portalegre to present the show at CAEP on 18 February.

Thus, we continue the invitation to imagine through listening, work that has already begun with the live recording sessions of the Thousand and One Nights project and of which this show is the first great fruit - an unpublished text that reflects on the city, exposing the intimacy of two lovers. In the context of the larger project, which projects one thousand and one Portuguese women who marked the 20th century, Maria da Graça Varella Cid's work is being reissued, in a partnership with the Tigre de Papel bookshop, at a launch that will also take place at the São Luiz Municipal Theatre on Friday 10 February at 7pm.

The documentary about the work process and the show itself will be broadcast on RTP2 on 5 October 2023, the date of the writer's 90th birthday.

Artistic Direction - Cátia Terrinca
Dramaturgy - Ricardo Boléo
Scenography - Bruno Caracol
Light - João P. Nunes
Props and Fugurines - Raquel Pedro
Voice - Bruno Huca
Movement - Sara Afonso
Design - David Costa
Interpretation - Cátia Terrinca, Cheila Lima, Elizabeth Pinard, Inês Sousa, Joana Martins, Júlia Zinga, Maria João, Mariana Bragada, Mariana Correia, Patrícia Andrade, Sara Brandão, Teresa Machado
Executive Production - A COLLECTIVE
Co-production - UMCOLETIVO, CAEP - Portalegre Arts and Entertainment Centre, RTP and São Luiz Municipal Theatre

José Oliveira