article

‘Prison is a system that has to be shaken off’
Catarina Câmara on CORPOEMCADEIA

Read

15 min

Maria Palma Teixeira

28 May 2024

Can beauty be a form of resistance? Can dance transform people, systems? An ongoing prison project uses dance to explore both chains and changes

I’m parked outside the Linhó Prison in Cascais, Portugal, waiting for the torrential rain to stop. The building was inaugurated in 1955, during the dictatorial regime, and now houses around 500 inmates, most between the ages of 20 and 30, according to a prison guard. I’m here to watch a contemporary dance class of CORPOEMCADEIA (‘body in chain’, literally translated, which in Portuguese plays with the double meaning of ‘cadeia’ as chain/prison), a dance project for inmates initiated in 2019 by Catarina Câmara with the support of Companhia Olga Roriz and the Portuguese Directorate General for Reintegration and Prison Services.

A few days ago I came across a quote by American songwriter Phil Ochs: ‘In such ugly times, the only true form of protest is beauty’. I believe that beauty can be overwhelming and even restorative. I believe that beauty can be a vehicle for change. Let’s not confuse beauty with straight, symmetrical, perfect, untouchable things. There is also beauty in unlikely places. As I enter the prison, I leave my belongings behind and cross two cold, rain-soaked courtyards at a brisk pace to reach the designated wing. When I interviewed Catarina Câmara before she invited me to this class, I asked her if it was a shock when she first came to Linhó, and she replied, ‘It was a big shock, but it’s like going into a post-war environment where everything is destroyed and suddenly you see a flower springing out of the ground. And it’s fantastic. It’s the same here, I’m in this terrible place, but suddenly a class ends and I realise that we’ve been touched, that we’ve all been mobilised.’

Catarina Câmara is known for her work as a dancer with Companhia Olga Roriz, but also trained in law, restorative justice and gestalt therapy and has developed numerous educational and social intervention projects. I had wanted to speak to her ever since I saw a 2022 performance by inmates from Linhó called A Minha História Não é Igual à Tua (‘My story is not the same as yours’), directed by Olga Roriz, at the sold-out Grand Auditorium of the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation. The imagery of these nine men measuring their cell sizes on stage with chalk left a lasting impression on me.

Catarina’s project doesn’t aim to glorify the inmates or downplay their reasons for being there. As she puts it, this isn’t about creating ‘Walt Disney’ stories of redemption and meritocracy, which she critiques for valuing circumstances over genuine merit. Instead, it seeks to challenge justice systems and hierarchies, focusing on what is hidden and unspoken.

More than being about dance in prisons, it’s about dance itself

Since its inception, CORPOEMCADEIA has involved over 120 inmates. The classes take place in the former chapel of the prison, a space devoid of bars, adorned with velvet curtains and an altar, yet with broken windows allowing cold and pigeons to enter. One participant remarked in an interview that the prison feels left behind when they attend these classes, offering a mental escape.

As I chat with guest teacher Yonel Serrano in the chapel, Ápio, Wilson, Tcherno, Rabie, Cláudio and Zé arrive and greet me with a handshake. During Yonel’s class, other inmates are invited to observe and potentially join the project. The class showcases not only the participants’ physical skills but also their artistic talents. In the end, a song evoking a vast desert landscape plays in the background, and a brief choreographic piece is performed, revealing beauty in this unlikely setting.

CORPOEMCADEIA is one of the few prison dance projects in the world. Here, Catarina shares her insights and future plans for the initiative, which continues to inspire change and foster beauty amidst adversity.

Dance is perhaps one of the most unlikely arts to enter a prison. Dancing involves vulnerability, freedom, expression – things that are more constrained in this context. What does CORPOEMCADEIA work on?

I think that more than being about dance in prisons, it’s about dance itself. It’s about the relationship with the body and the expression of the body, which is marginal to society’s activities. In a prison, where movement isn’t spontaneous, free or creative, dance seems almost contradictory to the system because it highlights the singularity of the human being. Philosopher Michel Foucault talked about the idea of shaking off the regime. Prison is a system that has to be shaken off. Rather than favouring peace and social security, prisons are often about calming social anxieties and fears, but aren’t beneficent overall. While there are individuals who naturally need to be kept from causing harm, most inmates are capable of great things, with great value, including dancing.

How do the people you’ve been working with receive this project?

Probably with the same curiosity and awkwardness as those outside. The issue isn’t that they’re in prison; it’s that they’re men with a masculinity to defend, which is intensified in the prison system. The issue of the patriarchal system is very acute in prison, not only in the prisoners, but in the expression of the entire prison system, from the director general to the guards. Dance allows us to work on deep structures of interpersonal relationships and self-awareness almost without imposition. The participants are volunteers, and what seems awkward at first is often received naturally.

In what way?

First of all, I’m working with a community of racialised people. This is significant, because I’m talking about Portuguese people who have in some way, throughout their lives, had contact with an African culture – a culture that is less angry with the body. When I introduce dance exercises in Linhó, something happens naturally, without much effort. I work with contact improvisation, presenting spontaneous dances where bodies touch and interact. This territory of discovery and enjoyment helps break through fear and shame. Prison desensitises people, but there’s a joy in play that is inherent in all of us.

Were you shocked when you first put CORPOEMCADEIA into practice and entered Linhó?

It is not easy to hear the slamming of the gates and see the conditions in Linhó. The prison is in a terrible state, dirty and damp. It’s shocking, yes. Over the years, working every week in these conditions, my body suffers. We imagine what prisons might be like and we see them in films, but when you go in there, you’re in contact with reality: it’s pouring rain in there, the prisoners eat terrible food, many of them are locked in their cells for 22 hours a day, there are rats in the yard…

How do they manage to develop CORPOEMCADEIA in these conditions?

Despite the conditions, we work in a privileged place. It’s the only place in the prison compound that doesn’t have bars. It’s like when you go to a post-war setting, you see everything destroyed and suddenly you see a flower springing up on the ground. And it’s fantastic. The same thing happens here: I’m in that horrible place, but suddenly we have a class where everyone leaves with a warm heart and you realise that we’ve been touched, that we’ve all been mobilised. For example, in the last session, one of the exercises was just asking questions, in pairs. One would ask a question and the other would answer with a question, and so on. At the end, I asked everyone to choose a question that had resonated with them, wrote them all down on different pieces of paper, and distributed them randomly so everyone got a question. Then I asked them to answer that question however they wanted. One was ‘why are you here?’. I explained they didn’t have to say their crime, but rather I asked ‘how do you want to answer that question truthfully?’ It was an emotional moment.

When you start the project, do you know what crimes they’ve committed?

I usually don’t know because it’s confidential. However, there’s usually a moment when they tell me, ‘Look, I did this.’ Deep down, it’s almost like a kind of confirmation: do you still accept me? It’s important for them to realise that they hadn’t controlled themselves and that they now have the responsibility to find the tools so that they don’t do it again; and also that they realise that they are aggressors as well as victims, and that they take responsibility for both.

I often tell this story: in the first edition of CORPOEMCADEIA, the first time I was alone with them, there was a strange atmosphere. I was with 15 young men, on my own…

There was no one with you?

I prefer no guards. So the first time, we were alone. There was an awkward silence, because they thought I might be uncomfortable being alone with them, and so I said ‘Look, guys, today we’re going to be alone. If anyone is afraid to be alone with me, please leave.’ I work a lot with humour and affection. The relationship I establish with them is also very much inspired by the relationship I had with my trainers in gestalt therapy in Florence, which has a lot to do with a relationship of shared intimacy. But of course, the barrier is always there: in the end, I go and they stay.

The first edition took place between 2019 and 2022. Did it culminate in the presentation at the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation’s Grand Auditorium?

For me, it was crucial for the project not to end in a climax. The show was significant, but it was more important to continue the process. Obviously, in an environment where people are much more vulnerable, where they are subjected to relationships of abandonment, where they have traumatic lives, it’s very important to think of this project both in terms of its artistic dimension and its social aspect. That’s why, when I designed CORPOEMCADEIA, I thought that the project shouldn’t end with the performance. The show is a high point and it’s very important, because it allows them to be seen in another way and, by realising this, they also see themselves in another way. At the same time, if it had ended on stage, that would have been very abrupt. Often, a highly beneficial and super-different event in someone’s life can, if not framed carefully, be counter-productive. Therefore, we established a final phase where the participants were invited to develop their solos, to form a bridge between the project and their lives, helping them to assimilate and incorporate the creative process into their own lives.

A minha história não é igual à tua (CORPOEMCADEIA 2022, Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation). © Susana Paiva

Are there any participants from the first edition who have moved on to the second?

Yes, anyone who wishes to continue is free to do so. Some have moved on, while others have left prison. One participant even interned here but later moved to France for work. He had a lot of ability and wanted to follow the world of dance, but he couldn’t afford to stay in Portugal and ended up going to France to work on building sites and be closer to his family. I often say that this isn’t Walt Disney… People are always looking for stories of overcoming and redemption, which is very much linked to the idea of meritocracy. That really gets on my nerves, because meritocracy doesn’t value merit, it values circumstances and we have to be very careful with these kinds of assessments.

Sometimes I’d say to them ‘let’s dream, what do you want to be?’ and the dream bar was always very low: ‘I want some kind of job in construction, cleaning…’ These people don’t allow themselves to dream. What I notice is that the life profile of these young men is very similar: usually it’s the hood, it’s the absent father, it’s the mother who works 24 hours a day, it’s the peers who are the street kids, it’s the drug dealing that starts at an early age, and it’s the total abandonment.

These people are emotionally very needy, they’ve had very complicated lives, but they can appreciate and are willing to accept the new. It’s not easy and there are people who leave, but those who stay are able to create deep bonds of affection, respect and commitment.

How many inmates have already taken part in this project?

Over 120 inmates have participated. Some stay for a few months, others complete the entire project, and others give up. The logistics within the prison system often make it challenging to reconcile CORPOEMCADEIA with other activities that allow them to reduce their sentence time and receive extra money, so they end up opting for those instead…

How are the CORPOEMCADEIA activities organised, and how is gestalt therapy integrated into them?

Gestalt therapy is integrated through a mixed approach. We have technical movement sessions with guest artists and Practices for Freedom sessions focusing on personal and interpersonal exploration. This involves body exercises and sensitisation to help participants access and express emotions and self-knowledge.

I’m a gestalt counsellor, and I’m the one who does the background work. I work in partnership with the Gestalt Institute in Florence and with Azioni e Contaminazioni, who are key partners, particularly Paolo Quattrini, who was and still is my mentor. We often have an Italian gestalt psychotherapist who comes to Lisbon to collaborate with us.

Is the aim to work on something deeper to bring about transformation or rehabilitation?

The aim is resocialisation, but resocialisation first requires self-knowledge. During sessions, I direct exercises to encourage participants to reflect on their actions and relationships, promoting self-awareness and emotional literacy. This is crucial for fitting into society and understanding oneself. What I often do is create a kind of organic grid of questions for them to answer in the course of the activities. These are clues to self-knowledge: they can’t be left unsaid, they have to be expressed.

I believe that art is capable of doing politics better than politics itself

This project also aims to contribute to a more humanised idea and collective awareness of what it’s like to be a prisoner?

Absolutely. CORPOEMCADEIA is political. I believe that art is capable of doing politics better than politics itself, stricto sensu. I’m using art to question and rethink systems of authority and societal norms. Dance challenges our consumption-driven language. CORPOEMCADEIA also criticises the prison system and, above all, the justice system. I integrate my backgrounds in law, dance and gestalt therapy to foster this critical reflection.

The project is therefore opening new doors?

Yes, we’re expanding CORPOEMCADEIA to artistic practices for social transformation. I’ve studied restorative justice and I am part of a group who aims to implement non-punitive approaches in the prison system, using arts for conflict resolution and transformation.

What support has CORPOEMCADEIA received?

The project received initial support from the PARTIS programme of the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation. In this second edition, they continue to support us financially to develop a programme combining dance, gestalt, and restorative justice. Right now I’m focused on getting people to help me think about how we create this programme to implement in prisons.

Is the idea to extend it to other prisons besides Linhó?

Yes, and also to educational centres.

Portrait of Catarina Câmara. © Susana Paiva — Catarina Câmara. © Susana Paiva

What have you learned from this project on a personal level?

I feel a great unease inside me when I look around and see what the world is like. I get sad and frustrated. I’ve realised, at the age of 48, that the way to pacify myself is by being there: not by thinking about reality, but by living it. For me, thinking about society and life implies a gesture of getting involved in life, and this work in prisons makes me feel truly connected to life. It’s challenging and exhausting but also deeply fulfilling. It forces me to deal with my emotions and expectations, pushing me to evolve as a human being. Life is very short, we’re here to challenge ourselves and to surpass ourselves. That’s what CORPOEMCADEIA gives me. ●

Linhó, Portugal

This is a shortened and edited translation of an interview originally published in Portuguese in Les Corps Dansants

With immense thanks to Susana Paiva for permission to use her photographs. With a background in performance art, Susana Paiva has been making experimental photography for over two decades, incorporating movement and the body into her photographic process. Find out more about her work at susanapaiva.com

‘Prison is a system that has to be shaken off’
Catarina Câmara on CORPOEMCADEIA

Hungry Sharks: Destination FCKD

Kentaro Kujirai: U-BU-SU-NA

Springback Assembly 2024: Budapest

Bojana Robinson: Machine