ARTIST’S PROFILE

Violeta Gil was born in Hoyuelos in 1983. She has a degree in English Philology from the Complutense University of Madrid and in Interpretation from the Royal Higher School of Dramatic Art. In 2005 she co-founded La Tristura drama company. She writes, directs and produces pieces that are shown in places such as the Festival de Otoño in the Community of Madrid, Thèâtre de la Ville in Paris, TEMPO Festival in Rio de Janeiro, Cena Contemporânea in Brasilia or the Kampnagel Summer International Festival in Hamburg, among others.

Future Lovers and Renacimiento are her last two stage productions. In 2015 she moved to Iowa City, receiving a scholarship to pursue a master’s degree in Creative Writing at the University of Iowa. She teaches theater and writing workshops at institutions such as La Casa Encendida, La Escuela de Escritores, or Teatros del Canal. In 2019, the Arrebato publishing house published her first book of poems, antes de que tiréis mis cosas; and for three years she toured with the show under the same name with the musician Abraham Boba.

She has been an artist in residence at Yaddo, Headlands Center for the Arts, Teatros del Canal, Matadero Madrid and Etopia Center of Art and Technology. She is part of the research and creation project of performative poetry “Una fiesta salvaje” in Matadero Madrid. She collaborates with the dance companies La Veronal and Mucha Muchacha as a playwright. She has collaborated with Elena López Riera in acting work for the feature film El Agua, and with Víctor Iriarte in Sobre todo de noche. Her first book of prose, LLego con tres heridas, was published by Caballo de Troya in October 2022. She translated to spanish, Book of Mutter, by Kate Zambreno, for La uña rota, and Let them eat chaos, by Kae Tempest for Rapture.

RESIDENCY GOALS: 

In the words of Violeta…

“I recently received an invitation from the National Dramatic Center in Madrid to write and direct a play for them. It would be my first commissioned theater piece and it scared me a bit but also got me excited. The condition is that it will have to be an adaptation of a piece of writing by a female Spanish author from the twentieth century. After many readings and deep consideration I’ve decided I would love to work on Carmen Martín Gaite. She was a prolific writer, who gained attention in the last decades of the century, but whose work is not discussed so often anymore. Her novels do speak to me, and make me want to inhabit her world. They are very human, witty, funny, serious and thrilling. She wrote non fiction and theatre as well, and there are collections of her conferences and letters that open up other exciting possibilities.

This next theater project I’ll be engaging in will certainly become a collaboration with other artists who will work on lightning design, set, sound, etc; the direction of the piece will be shared with my colleagues in the theater company. But the writing will be a solo work. I have found it essential to have concentrated time outside of my routine to be able to think, read and write and for that purpose, I’d love to spend time at La Moissie. The idea is to bring some of her work with me, and other art works that appeared during her time, and start writing and composing what will become the play that will open in Februrary 2024.”