Biography of Pedro Antunes
Portuguese performance maker and performer, born in Lisbon and currently living and developing his work in London, where he also completed a MA in Contemporary Performance Making at Brunel University.
Pedro holds a degree in Theatre Studies, University of Evora and also trained in masks including Commedia dell’arte and clown techniques in FCPT where he also had his first professional theatre job in 1998 working as a mime.
Since then he has been working, performing and collaborating with different performance artists and theatre companies including Rotozaza; Robin Deacon; Tik Tak Boom; La Pocha Nostra and Cataphonic – performance artists who all aim to create innovative and challenging performance work.
In 2005 he presented his first directed performance, Narrow Rooms, a theatre and movement performance. This production was developed for the Ground Works in London and toured in two international performance festivals. Following this initial experience in directing, he created a second piece entitled Wrapped Bodies. This performance installation was a created for the Camberwell Arts Festival and also the London Biennale. More recently he created The Missing Parts (a live family re-construction), co-created Electric Garden (short film about romance and death) and produced & performed Night of The Enormous Chicken (site specific performance – a surrealistic tale).
He is dedicated to the creation of performance work that explores the intimate nature of human relationships, using strong visuals and experimenting with the interaction between theatre and visual arts . He brings people together to experience a celebration that can have the form of a party or a ritual, while the audience is confronted with the idea of displacement. His work merges movement with vivid imagery, and slapstick with a sophisticated sense of visual, absurd humour. His process is practical experimentation led and he often starts by working on short stories, tales, legends or myths that inhabit people’s imagination to de-constructs them into theatrical and physical pieces that communicate utopian spaces, dreams and ideas that live beyond our consciousness.
Pedro’s work has been commissioned by Coleccao B (Evora, Portugal), Quarta Parede (Covilha, Portugal), Performance Initiative Network (London) and The Scene Pool (London), and has been shown at various festivals and venues.
Pedro is a highly professional artist and practitioner, whose work is challenging, insightful and engaging. His commitment to his practice is evident in how his work pushing boundaries within the theatre discipline and his own artistic journey. Working with Pedro you appreciate and understand that he works with an intense creativity and has a commitment to his practice that has an almost spiritual value. I stand by and support his work, his productions are unique and of exceptionally high quality.
Kerry Irvine, Performance Initiative, Artistic Director