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Sylvia Jaimes Niño

ARTIST PROFILE


Silvia Jaimes is an interdisciplinary artist whose practice centers on the body as expressive matter and presence as a territory of investigation. Her work unfolds within interdisciplinary collectives, expanding her research into fields such as dance, music, history, and language studies.

She has participated in festivals, residencies and exhibitions across Colombia, Brazil, Mexico, Italy, Croatia, Portugal and Switzerland. 

Key venues include the Kunstmuseum Thurgau, the Festival de Danza en la Ciudad in Bogotá, the Festival de la Imagen in Manizales and the Festival Dança à Deriva in São Paulo.

She is also a member of two international cultural associations — Colapso, based in Portugal, and Cosmos, which promotes artistic exchange between Colombia and Switzerland. Through both, she contributes to artistic production, event organization and international residency programs.

CV


Cosmos Supercluster. Museo de Arte de Thurgau// Warth SUI-2019 SEP


Dança Invisível. Palácio do Sobralinho// Vila Franca da Xira POR -2019 MAY


L´occhio Irresponsabile. Neo Associazione Culturale // Udine ITA -2018 ABR


X Festival Danza en la Ciudad. Casa del Teatro Nacional // Bogotá COL -2017 NOV


IV Festival Pliegues y Despliegues. La Factoría L' explose // Bogotá COL -2017 ABR 


Share Moore. Eisenwerk Shedhalle // Frauenfeld SWI - 2016 AUG

 

Season. Fundación Teatro Varasanta // Bogotá COL -2016 MAY


Festival Orgánico. Museo de Arte del Tolima// Ibagué COL -2016 MAY


Sinfonía Trópico. Flora Ars Natura // Bogotá COL -2015 DIC

2 edição Festival Dança à Deriva. C. de Exp. Coreográfica // São Paulo BRA -2014 DEC


Temporada de Montajes Colombianos. Teatro Jorge Eliécer Gaitán// Bogotá COL -2012 JUL


X Festival de la Imagen. Universidad de Caldas// Manizales COL -2011 ABR

Festival Internacional Grado Cero. Teatro Libre Centro // Bogotá COL -2011 SEP

Beca de Creación Interdisciplinar. Teatro Jorge Eliécer Gaitán // Bogotá COL -2011 DIC


III Festival de Danza en la Ciudad. Fundación Teatro Varasanta // Bogotá COL -2010 NOV


Lunes y Martes de Performance.La Factoría L´explose // Bogotá COL -2010 FEB


2 Encuentro Inter. de Artes Vivas. Museo de Artes U. Nacional // Bogotá COL -2009 AGO

PERFIL DE ARTISTA

Silvia Jaimes es una artista interdisciplinar cuya práctica parte del cuerpo como materia expresiva y de la presencia como territorio de investigación. Su trabajo nace del encuentro con otros lenguajes, y se desarrolla en el marco de colectivos interdisciplinares que amplían y enriquecen la investigación, llevándola a territorios como la danza, la música, la filosofía, la historia y los estudios del lenguaje.

A lo largo de su trayectoria ha participado en festivales, residencias y exposiciones en Colombia, Brasil, México, Italia, Croacia, Portugal y Suiza, siendo parte de escenarios como el Kunstmuseum Thurgau, el Festival de Danza en la Ciudad  en Bogotá, el Festival de la Imagen de Manizales y el Festival Dança à Deriva de São Paulo, entre otros.

Paralelamente a su práctica artística, hace parte de dos asociaciones internacionales de creación y gestión cultural — Colapso, con sede en Portugal, y Cosmos, que promueve lazos de intercambio artístico entre Colombia y Suiza —, desde las cuales participa en la producción artística, la organización de eventos y la gestión de residencias a nivel internacional. Esta trayectoria de alcance plural da cuenta de un compromiso sostenido con la experimentación y el encuentro entre disciplinas.

Theatre and Dance Festivals


Dança Invisível 2019. Palácio do Sobralinho // Lisboa POR 

2019 May


X Festival Danza en la Ciudad. Casa del Teatro Nacional // Bogotá COL 

2017 Nov


IV Festival Pliegues y Despliegues. La Factoría L' explose // Bogotá COL 

2017 Abr


Season. Fundación Teatro Varasanta // Bogotá COL 

2016 May 


2 edição Festival Dança à Deriva. C. de Experimentación Coreográfica // São Paulo  BRA 

2014 Dic


Season of Colombian pieces. Teatro Jorge Eliécer Gaitán// Bogotá, COL 

2012 Jul


Festival Internacional Grado Cero. Teatro Libre Centro // Bogotá, COL 

2011 Sep 


Interdisciplinary Creation Grant 2011.Teatro Jorge Eliécer Gaitán// Bogotá, COL 

2011 Dec


III Festival de Danza en la Ciudad. Fundación Teatro Varasanta // Bogotá, COL 

2010 Nov


Lunes y Martes de Performance.La Factoría L´explose // Bogotá, COL 

2010 Feb



Exhibitions Visual Arts


Cosmos Supercluster. Ittingen Kunstmuseum// Thurgau SWI

 2019 Sep


L´occhio Irresponsabile. Neo Associazione Culturale // Udine ITA

2018 Abr


Festival Orgánico. Museo de Arte del Tolima// Ibagué COL 

2016 May


Sinfonía Trópico. Flora Ars Natura // Bogotá COL

2015 Dec


X Festival de la Imagen. Universidad de Caldas// Manizales COL 
2011 Abr

2 Encuentro Inter. de Artes Vivas. Museo de Artes U. Nacional // Bogotá COL  
2009 Ago


Portfolio

Ana & Louise

2025 (on-going project) 

"The day I met my grandmother, I was 45, and she was 114. Her bones rested in a beautiful wooden box, along with an unidentified body.."


    I don't have any memories of my grandmother as a child, I never established a relationship with her as a kid. We meet now, both in our forties, in a kind of camaraderie;  observing a world that has changed a  in several things. Our conversation unfolds more among friends than relatives.  It becomes relevant when we realize that some of the issues that determined my grandmother's choices seem to be building up again. 

Learn more about this project, read other stories

Birds that Echo Their Way Through the Looking Glass

2019 SEP

COSMOS Supercluster. Kunstmuseum Thurgau// Warth, SWI


2019 MAY

Dança Invisível. Palácio do Sobralinho// Vila Franca da Xira, POR

"My observational data indicates that there is no exclusive avian vulnerability to windows based on age or sex, season, time of day, weather, window type or setting.

The findings indicate that glass is an invisible and potentially lethal hazard for all birds, but especially for those in flight".

Pg.11DK, 1989.

“Several authors have speculated that birds hit windows because of: (1) defective eyes (Willet 1945), (2) impaired vision due to smoke (Langridge 1960), blinding glare (), mist () alcohol (), or diverted attention (Dunbar 1949, Giller 1960, Bent, Raible, Valum, 1968)".

Even though it is an ancient curiosity, the interest in understanding the sound manifestations of birds remains latent. It is as if it were a place to which we end up returning/visiting out of sonic curiosity, sometimes in the hope of establishing communication and other times with the desire to exercise dominance. 

This project has its starting point in a scientific article that proposed a cognitive parallel between songbirds and human primates, recognizing in both the possibility of learning and memorizing complex sound phrases to develop a generational auditory memory and communication through language. 

DIRECTOR: Sylvia Jaimes

SOUNDSCAPE AND SOUND OBJECTS: Leonel Vásquez

VIDEO INSTALLATION: Bojan Mucko

COREOGRAPHY: Helena Reis and Sylvia Jaimes

PERFORMERS: Mirjam Wanner, Helena Reis, Bojan Mucko, Sylvia Jaimes

Special Collaboration: workers of the Ittingen Foundation

IMAGES by: Mirjam Wanner, Goran Skofic, Miguel Braga

Special thanks to: Cosmos collective, Thurgau Kunstmuseum

Empathy

2018 APR 

L´occhio Irresponsabile. Neo Associazione Culturale // Udine ITA


2017 NOV 

Festival Danza en la Ciudad. Casa del Teatro Nacional // Bogotá COL


2017 APR 

Festival Pliegues y Despliegues 2017. La Factoría Léxplose // Bogotá COL


2016 MAY 

Fundación Teatro Varasanta //Temporada. Bogotá, COL


Interdisciplinary ensemble


Empathy resembles a desire for correspondence in a society with a lack of  communities. In this piece we construct a virtual version of meaningful encounters with puppets, tridimensional animal figures that resemble spirits, posing, and numbing choreographies, reinforcing a sense of solitude and  impotence.  

DIRECTOR: Sylvia Jaimes

SOUNDSCAPE: Mateo Mejía

LIGHTING DESIGN: Luis David Cáceres and Juan Carlos Aldana

CHOREOGRAPHY/ performers: Sofía Mejía, Mateo Mejía, Juan Camilo Herrera

PUPPETER: César Duarte

3D MODELS and animation: Daniel Rodríguez 

CUSTOME DESIGN: Rebeca Rocha

SCENOGRAPHY: Hilda Niño, César Duarte, Sylvia Jaimes

VIDEO FOOTAGE & PHOTO: Felipe Camacho, Carlos Camacho, Jaime Gómez

Special thanks to: Estefanía Gómez, Beto Urrea, Diego Sylva, Constance VN


Link to other videos

 Empathy resembles a desire for correspondence in a society with scare spontaneous communities. 


In this piece, a wild desire for affinity manifests in several attempts to develop a spiritual choreography; we improvise Sufi movements to approach the dance of celestial bodies;and resemble the communicational behaviour of whales. 

"We intend to establish close communication with a huge whale, trusting the anatomical coincidences in both of our brains. We confront the other with our deepest desires, bumping into our psychological boundaries." 

Gallada del Toche

2016 MAY

Festival Orgánico. Museo de Arte del Tolima// Ibagué (Col)


2015 DEC

Sinfonía Trópico. Flora Ars Natura // Bogotá (Col)


"La Gallada is a sound experiment in which we deconstruct the sound of birds and transform it into an ensemble, a band. The idea for “La Gallada” came from the name given to groups of young boys who get up to mischief in the neighborhoods in the afternoons. The galladas summon their members with a loud whistle, just as birds would to warn or greet one another. For us, it was a perfect metaphor, and we created our own whistle for our gallada.

We try to translate the birds’ sound universe into the human voice, or we ask ourselves: what instruments can replicate these sounds? 

The project is conceived as a laboratory. Our starting point is to listen, listen, listen. Sometimes we use recordings made on-site, visit places where these birds can be spotted, or research their songs in sound collections available online, such as Cornell University’s. Then, together with our guests, we explore the sonic possibilities of translating what we hear.

For example, when we worked with Nicolás Vega, a musician and visual artist who dared to “speak like a bird” through the sound of his cello, and Mateo Mejía, a guitarist and composer, we created several soundscapes. On another occasion, we worked with Carolina Ceballos and the Oper choir, creating musical interpretations of the sounds of the crested tit and the pigeon in the form of choral arrangements. 
In every version of the project we’ve created, we start by working with birds native to the local environment; when we developed the piece for Bogotá, for example, we worked with blackbirds, crested tits, and great tits. Generally, to reproduce a bird’s sound, you need more than two people; this is due to the way a bird’s vocal apparatus works. Its airflow system emits more than one sound at a time. For this bird’s sound, two voices working in relay are needed; at first, each of us had a different part, and we synchronized to be able to fragment it.” 

Link to video

Investitures (Investiduras)

2012 July

Season of Colombian pieces. Teatro Jorge Eliécer Gaitán// Bogotá (Col)


2011 Dec

Grant: "Interdisciplinary project 2011". Teatro Jorge Eliécer Gaitán // Bogotá (Col)


Investiduras is a project that explores the question of identities and their capacity for change. It is a patchwork quilt of stolen dresses, a jumble of fibers and paints, a mutating cloak that allows one to change one’s personality. It is the risk of contagion implicit in contact.

Investiduras dissects the physical act of dressing: the gesture, the poetics, and the politics of donning a garment.

It is an interdisciplinary project that explores the languages of sculpture, painting, installation, sound, and performance, in an experimental staging where all these elements are intertwined. 

watch the video

Dirigida por: Colectivo los Desvestidos (Alejandro Cárdenas, Jenny Fonseca, Rebeca Rocha, Eduardo Oramas, Sylvia Jaimes)

Video en vivo: Diego taborda, Sebastián Rocha

Performers: Heloise Cuissins, Abelardo Jaimes, César García, Nelson Martínez, Marco Gómez, Laura Barceló, Laura Barragán, Edwin Vargas, Luisa Camacho, Ricardo Villota, Juliana Atuesta, Andrés Lagos, Bibiana Carvajal, Vanesa Henriquez.

Diseño de Iluminación: Juan Carlos Aldana

Diseño sonoro: Ana maría Romano

Confección de tapete de ropa,: Hilda Niño y Maria Eugenia de Maldonado.

Images by: 


Felipe Camacho (Pausar)


Al Oído de un Detective Salvaje

2011 APR

X Festival de la Imagen. Universidad de Caldas// Manizales COL


A sound cartography developed in reference to the book by Roberto Bolaño “Los Detectives Salvajes”. 

Soundscapes captured in Bogotá and México DF. Language Spanish.


This Net Art proposes an alternative way of visualizing and narrating the prismatic story of two friends that disappear from a teenage intense social circle. The book from Bolaño is constructed among multiple voices that conform the body of investigation (interviews) done by the detectives, that assume the missing kids case. 

We take advantage of this multiplicity and transform it into a constellation of overlapping places, accents and voices.

(This interactive is currently unavailable because of a compatibility with new browsers, a video demo may be previewed on the following link)

Link to video

 Based on the book by Roberto Bolaño: 

"Los Detectives Salvajes".


Net Art by: 

Sergio Caballero and Sylvia Jaimes

Soundscapes captured by: Sylvia Jaimes and Alejandro Lurduy.

Special thanks to:

FONCA Mexico, the Ministry of Culture in Colombia and Festival de la Imagen Colombia.

Daniel Montero, Makia Lara and Sandra Gómez. 

Vocal Bucal

2014 Dec

Dança a la Deriva. C. de Experimentación Coreográfica // São Paulo, (Bra)


2011 Sep 

Festival Internacional Grado Cero. Teatro Libre Centro // Bogotá, (Col)


2010 Nov

III Festival de Danza en la Ciudad. Fundación Teatro Varasanta // Bogotá, (Col)


2010 Feb

Lunes y Martes de Performance .La Factoría L´explose. Bogotá (Col)


2009 Sept

Operation Antilope- Bogotá. El Estudio// Bogotá (Col)


2009 Aug
2 Encuentro Inter. de Artes Vivas. Museo de Arte, U. Nacional//Bogotá (Col)

In Spanish, the word vocal refers to sound manifestations as singing and speech, and at the same time, one of the primary forms of language: vowels. On the other hand, bucal is used to name the mouth’s area, larynx, and vocal chords, where the voice emission takes place.

Link to video

Brief

Vocal Bucal is an open experiment that looks to bring sound to its material substance. It is a scrutiny of fragility from diverse angles: the fragility of technology, communication, and language. The performance takes place inside a large spider web made of knitted Copper wire, a sound installation that responds sonically to touch.

The performer touches and breaks portions of the web, provoking a subtle noise that progressively becomes a concert for noise. Everything concludes with a song in which the performer’s voice transitions from lyrical to guttural screaming. The delicate actions experienced at the beginning are transformed into an event where all elements collapse because of vibration.

DIRECTOR and PERFORMER: Sylvia Jaimes

SOUNDSCAPE: Mateo Mejía

LIGHTING DESIGN: Luis David Cáceres 

CUSTOME DESIGN: Diego Jaimes

SCENOGRAPHY/ Installation:Sylvia Jaimes

VIDEO FOOTAGE & Photo by: Diego Jaimes, Diego Taborda, Juan Alonso, Carlos Mario Lema, Jenny Fonseca, Sofía Mejía, Alejandro Cárdenas.