Marcus Borja

Marcus Borja holds two PhDs – Sorbonne Nouvelle (2015) and Sciences, Arts, Creation, Research (SACRe) from Paris Sciences et Lettres (2017) – and is also a graduate of École du Louvre (history of art and museology), École Supérieure d’Art Dramatique and Conservatoire National Supérieur d’Art Dramatique. At the age of 24, having obtained a literature degree in his native Brazil, Borja moved to France where he taught Brazilian civilisation and Portuguese to secondary-school students in the Paris region, while attending Jaques Lecoq International Theatre School. His many areas of study are reflected in the polyphonic, multiform nature of his creations, which have won the esteem of his peers. Le Chant des Signes, Théâtre, Intranquillité, Bacchantes – all relate directly to his multidisciplinary interests and connections.

A stage director, actor, musician, playwright and teacher, Borja sees himself as an artist-researcher-educationalist, and these three perspectives continually interact, both on his professional journey and in his creations. He is particularly interested in chorality, vocality and musicality as the bases for stage creation. The curiosity that underpins both his teaching and his publications inspired him to set up, in 2015, Pratiques de la Voix sur Scène: an international symposium at Théâtre Gérard Philippe in Saint-Denis, with two research colleagues. His artistic and musical collaborations have been presented most recently at Théâtre de la Ville, Musée du Louvre, Colline Théâtre National, Théâtre du Nord and Comédie-Française.

Marcus Borja continues to engage with multidisciplinary projects, in particular a participatory choral work with educational and cultural networks in Japan. Working simultaneously with a number of actor-performers, he borrowed and repurposed motifs from musical composition (polyphony, counterpoint, ostinato) to explore and rescale, through vocality in movement, perceptions of time and public space.

Photos : © Christophe-Raynaud-de-Lage