La Pocha Nostra, Guillermo Gómez-Peña’s performance art troupe and organization, has developed a pedagogical model that functions both as an act of citizen diplomacy and as a means to create “ephemeral communities” of diverse participants. The basic premise of these collaborations is founded on an ideal: “If we learn to cross borders on stage, we may learn how to do so in larger social spheres.” La Pocha strives to eradicate myths of purity and dissolve borders surrounding culture, ethnicity, gender, language, and métier.

Register for the Workshop on October 2

This afternoon intensive workshop provides participants with an introduction to La Pocha Nostra’s signature pedagogical tools that have been at the forefront of hemispheric performance and politics for over 30 years. Offered not only as a laboratory for participants with formal arts practices, it is offered to students, activists, and scholars as a means to disentangle the layers of self from patriarchal and colonial trauma that limit the body’s potential as a powerful, ancestral, technology for transformation. Specifically designed for UIC students, La Pocha Nostra core members will facilitate performance rituals, exercises, games and other pedagogical surprises!