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Jorge De Hoyos is an American dancer/performer and choreographer living and working in Berlin, Germany since 2012.
He was born in Los Angeles, California in 1984 and got his BA in Cultural Anthropology at the University of California in Santa Cruz as well as a graduate certificate in Theater Arts. He was a Mexican folk dancer who also loved to do swing and salsa before beginning to pursue contemporary dance and performance in college. Between 2007 and 2012 he was active within the dance and queer performance community and DIY (Do-It-Yourself) culture in San Francisco where he was able to integrate other interests into his artistic practice like Permaculture Design, spiritual and sexual healing, anthropology and activism. Much of his work sources from ideas of the energetic body and principles developed by healer/writer Caroline Myss, and choreographers/collaborators Sara Shelton Mann (San Francisco) and Meg Stuart (Berlin). Keith Hennessy (San Francisco) is also another major influence in the tension he grapples with between art and activism. Working with all three has also formed his practice and commitment to improvisation in process and performance. Over the years he sources ideas and practices from various healing and spiritual approaches into his art and life. Examples include the work from Transforming Cellular Memory, Sexological Bodywork, psychic readings, yoga practices, meditation, various shamans and energy workers, and his upbringing in Roman Catholicism provided a grounding spiritual literacy though he no longer practices religion in his life. As a performer in San Francisco, Jorge has worked with artists like Keith Hennessy (Delinquent in 2008 and Turbulence: a dance about the economy since 2010), Christine Bonansea, Naked Empire Bouffon Company, Laura Arrington’s SQUART, Jesse Hewit, and many others. He performed in different productions with his mentor Sara Shelton Mann, including Zeropoint in 2011 and the solo The Love of Emptiness in 2012. He was invited to perform in Meg Stuart’s Auf den Tisch! in San Francisco in 2011 and then later for Sketches/Notebook in 2013 which relocated him to Berlin. Other collaborations with Stuart include Atelier III in Brussels in 2017, Projecting [Space[ in Germany from 2017, a guest replacement performance in Until Our Hearts Stop in Berlin in 2019, and the Tanzkongress 2019: A Long Lasting Affair in Dresden at Hellerau. He has worked with many other European and non-European artists like Andre Uerba, Anne-Mareike Hess, Anna Konjetzky, costa compagnie, Yoshiko Chuma, Marc Philip Gabriel & Kieron Jina, Jason Danino Holt, Rebecca Egeling, Julian Weber, Tino Segal, and again most recently with Lea Moro, among others. As a choreographer, works include his debut performance in San Francisco called STICK in 2009 at the radical queer art catalyst Mama Calizo’s Voice Factory where he explored power and desire within contemporary gay male relationships. His Leakage Study series begun in 2010 are works of endurance body art manifesting ideas of the body as a container/containment and its malfunction/failure. Also in 2010 he co-authored Bonjour le Matin with Macklin Kowal, an epic, francophilic and mobile work asking the questions: Quelle est la nature de l'action ? À quoi sert l'absurdité ? Peut-on arriver finalement à comprendre la dynamique de nos pensées telles qu'elles résonnent dans le milieu des autres ?. He also began ongoing research called Departing Things presented as a show at The Garage in San Francisco in 2012 and then later presented as a new performance version at the Tanztage Festival 2014 in Berlin. In 2013 he created choreography to the second half of Igor Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring (The Sacrifice) at the Sacre 100 Festival at HAU 2 in Berlin and then a draft of full choreography at the 100 Grad Festival at Ballhaus Ost in 2015. He presented a sketch of new ideas called An Apology for Losers at adaStudio and Dock 11 in the Autumn of 2015. In September 2016 he premiered the solo CONDUIT at Dock 11. In 2018 he showed a new work-in-progress called Open Air through KunstKooperative, Verlin and Uferstudios in Berlin. Some of these works are constructed over time when a residency or showing opportunity arises. Open Air and An Apology for Losers and Leakage Study are examples of this...to see them grow over time. Other spheres of activity include writing, teaching, sex work, event coordination and many many many many other odd jobs. He wrote articles and interviews for the San Francisco publication In Dance from 2008-2014 as well as an article in 2018 for the New Zealand-based Contemporary HUM following an artistic process called "Alexa Wilson: 999 Alchemist Trauma Centre/Power Centre." He has facilitated dance and sexological workshops as private initiatives and for the Stretch Festival at Village-Berlin, a community center for GBTQ+ men, and he also engages in sensual erotic massage and other traditional forms of sex work. He plans to begin facilitating more workshops that combine his interest in Authentic Movement, energy grounding and cultivating practices and Permaculture Design. He just completed his Masters degree in the Solo/Dance/Authorship (SODA) program of the Inter-University Centre for Dance (HZT) through the University of Arts Berlin. For his final presentation in 2019, he premiered a new work called Spirited. Also coming from his time there is the Mineralwasser Kollektiv, which is made up of his graduated cohort of the SODA program. They recently premiered a new work for one audience member at a time at Dock 11 in September 2020, called: /\/\/\/ |||: What Does It Mean To Be Alone?. He currently finished the creation phase with Lea Moro for the new work All Our Eyes Believe which premiered in Geneva in September and awaiting pending tours in Switzerland, etc in 2021. He's also writing many applications for funding, residencies and presentations. An artistic and lifestyle priority that has been developing over the last year and catalyzed by the current pandemic is to integrate the ethics and principles of Permaculture Design into his work. As an underlying value, Permaculture seeks to remember the body as nature and to work towards balance and regeneration with the earth, society and vibrant future systems. Though he does not have his dream farm and community art/healing/workshop space yet, he is at least working to align with Permaculture Design thinking in his ongoing creative endeavors and urban freelance situation. At least, he is practicing daily to ground his Qi energy down. Going on walks where there is nature is heaven. He also started learning Kung Fu and Tai Chi. A Vision For The Future Yes, one day to steward a space/place that's a Permaculture Farm + Art/Dance Studio + Kung Fu Temple + Sexological Bodywork Institute + Intersectional Philosophy Salon + Healing/Spiritual center...in nature yet not far from a cool city!! That's the dream! :) Though I currently appreciate Berlin as well as my experiences in San Francisco, Santa Cruz and the greater Los Angeles area.. |
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