Phila 7 emerged in early 2005 with the aim of searching for new languages and media. Since his first work, dramaturgy and technology are tools for the development of new ways for the Performing Arts.

With his first show, Galileo Galilei, the company has shown that convergence of languages to perform a classic text with videographic projections and live presentations of the Chamber Orchestra of USP at Teatro Alfa in Sao Paulo.

In July 2005, Beto Matos and Marcos Azevedo (Phila 7) writes the text "The Relative Truth of Thing Itself" (A Verdade Relativa da Coisa em Si) to intensify the relations of its dramaturgy with the media universe. At the end of that same year the text wins the Dramaturgy Award 2005 of FUNARTE (Brazilian Art Foundation).

In 2006, with "Play on Earth", Phila 7 become the pioneer in Brazil to use the Internet in order to develop and present a play that gathered three casts in three continents simultaneously: Phila 7 in Sao Paulo, Station Opera House in New Castle (England) and Theatreworks in Singapore.

Also in 2006, the dance project "OP1" is selected for the Rumos Dança of Itaú Cultural, with debut in March 2007. OP1 explores the limits between the real and imaginary through the principles of Optical Art and the interaction between dance, video, light and music.

In September, Phila 7 is invited by Itaú Cultural to integrate the activities of Emoção Art.ficial 3.0 with the show "The Relative Truth of Thing Itself", premiered in September 2006.

Also in May 2007, the Phila 7 inaugurated its headquarters in Sao Paulo, GAG – Global Art Group (www.gag.art.br) - to aggregate and irradiate new crossings of contemporary art. The GAG is open to the multiplicity of languages.

In October 2007, Phila 7 produced the show "FEVER" (FEBRE) (text and direction by Marcos Azevedo), with DRAMAX* group. Premiered at GAG, the play discusses the depersonalization of the Man inside the capitalist system.

In December 2007 the GAG presented "Wheel" (RODA): a combination of dance with different media and the experience with new artistic languages. Dances, videos, installantions, performances and debates that confer motion to the space with the exhibition of the Brazilian contemporary production about the body, composed of 16 works and 22 artists from different regions of the country.

Phila 7 also received Julian Maynard Smith (director of Station House Opera, England) for the construction of the script to the show "What's Wrong with the World?" - Play on Earth series. The premiere will be at OI FUTURO (Brazilian Cultural Center), in April 2008 in Rio de Janeiro.

Play by B. Brecht is staged by Phila7 Company, Paulo César Pereio and the Chamber Orchestra of USP

Beth Néspoli writes for “O Estado de SP (newspaper)” 4th of August 2005

The author of the book History of World Theatre, edited in Brazil by Editora Perspectiva, Margot Berthold dedicates several pages to texts about epic theater developed by Bertolt Brecht (1898-1956), author whose political plays, according to her, challenge ideological dogmas.

"Suas peças não apresentam palavras de ordem - desmascaram fatos" (In his plays no rules are implied, but facts demystified) writes the historian. If you still have doubts you must know see Life of Galileo, one of the most instigating and well-written pieces of this German author.

With the title Galileo Galilei, the text received one of the best conceptions of the Teatro Oficina Company and returns to the stage thanks to a joint initiative of the Chamber Orchestra of USP, conducted by Gil Jardim, and the theatre director Rubens Velloso.

Galileo Galilei opens this Friday in Alfa Theatre, with the participation of 35 orchestra musicians, a choir of eight voices, eleven actors and Paulo César Pereio as the main character, anyone interested must run for there will only be seven presentations.

“The initial idea came from maestro Gil, who wanted the season to start with a piece that united different art forms,” says Rubens Velloso. “I’ve always been fascinated by the play and when I saw the staging of this play by the Oficina Company, I was left with no doubts.”

Given the proposal to merge different art forms, desired by Gil, images are projected on a screen that divides audience and actors during the play. “Projections are not used in excess” Velloso assures. “They will only be used in exact moments, for example, for the explosion of stars in a convulsing sky, images made by NASA”.
The songs were also chosen carefully. The composers go from Vicenzo Galileo, the main character’s father, to contemporary artists like Arvo Part.

Rubens Velloso reminds us it is the International Year of Physics. “What’s most important though, is to be able to stage this wonderful piece”.

In this play, Brecht shows how Galileo’s discoveries influenced the lives of ordinary people. If the earth is no longer the center of the universe, then was the Catholic Church wrong? Even though its power is grounded on knowledge? Thus the importance of Galileo’s’ attitude of denying his theory to save his own life.
Galileo, son of the musician Vicenzo, was born in Pisa in 1564 and studied in Florence during his childhood. When back to his hometown, he left Medicine University and began to study mathematics and in a near future it will be as a math teacher that he will make a living.

His biographers describe him as a temperamental man who is able to appreciate equally a good scientific discussion, a refined meal and a beautiful woman’s company.
Early in his research he improved the telescope - which was brought to him by a student and which he sold as being his very own discovery- and began to study star movements.
Denies Aristotelian physics and by combining heliocentric theories with his own observations of the telescope he proves that the earth is not the centre of the universe and that it moves around the sun. Discovers the Saturn rings, studies sun spots.

In 1933 he is prosecuted by the Holy Inquisition, that prohibited Copernicans, under torture he publicly renounces his theories. From then on he lived under house arrest and Church surveillance.
Blind and observed he still manages to write and smuggle his scientific work via an ex-student to Holland where they are printed. He dies at the age of 78 in the company of his daughter.

Brecht shows in his play the various facets of this man, his blind belief in reason, his cowardice and his unforgettable sensuality. Just after he abjures, Galileo says the famous quote “unhappy the land that is in need of heroes”.

Anyone who would like to find out more about Galileo’s discoveries will have the opportunity to do so: on stage, the astrophysics scientist Reinaldo de Carvalho will give a brief lecture on cosmology just before the beginning of the play.

Play joins three stages through the internet

Article published in Folha de São Paulo newspaper – SP, 14/06/2006 Ilustrada section
VALMIR SANTOS

Imagine Nelson Rodrigues writing “Vestido de Noiva” worrying about how to apply the three levels of his narrative (reality, hallucination and memory) to the windows of a computer. This, with the given proportions, is what the “Play on Earth” project pertains to be, by mixing real and virtual relations with actors in São Paulo, Singapore and Newcastle (England) simultaneously.

This unusual experiment opens this evening at ten o’clock in the Unip amphitheatre. Taking in account the time zones the play will be shown at the same time in an English gallery and in a non-mainstream theatre in Singapore.

“Screen and stage combined produce a single piece, that’s the idea” says Rubens Velloso, 55, director of Phila7 Company, which was created last year and together with the Station Opera House in London and TheatreWorks in Singapore carried out the project.

The actors (four in São Paulo and three in each of the other cities) will not speak much and act a fragmented story; movements and gestures provide backing for the drama.

In each site tree overlapping screens will show a “common truth”, and according to Velloso, a plot that relates to conceptual issues about synapse, the virtual world and reality.

During the live broadcast, each cast will be able to improvise with the footage seen on screen. “The challenge is to make a unit out of it all” says the director. The broadcast will be made via internet, using the streaming system.

According to Velloso, the project relies on technology to ensure good network connections between the three continents. “We have a special internet phone line and VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol). In case of any technical failure the play will not be hindered because of the possibilities a live drama ensures”, says Marisa Riccitelli Sant'Ana, who is co-director of the São Paulo production.

The presentations of “Play on Earth” in São Paulo will be held until the 24th of June at different times- morning, afternoon and night-, according to the times zones of each country.

The season will happen together with the International Arts Festival of Singapore, from the 1st of June until the 25th.

WHY WATCH

In 2004 the creator of the project, the Station House Opera Company, produced very similar events in three city of the UK and in same building apartments in Holland. The use of the internet is incipient in the Brazilian stage.

Phila7 Company debuts a high-tech satire about the media

Vídeo by Rodrigo Gontijo

At the Itaú Cultural stage the cast dialogues with filmed footage projected on screens, live footage from the audience and internet links, in a plot that starts with a blind date.

From the 7th to the 10th of September, theatre arts and technology meet at the Itaú Cultural stage for the first season of the play A Verdade Relativa da Coisa em Si, by the Phila7 Company, directed by Rubens Velloso and soundtrack by André Abujamra. The play is written by Marcos Azevedo and Beto Matos, members of Phila7 Company and is winner of the “Funarte Dramaturgia 2005 Região Sudeste” award. It is a high-tech satire of the media that questions the truth and instantaneous fame created by the press and how people relate to them. The production is part of the programming of Emoção Art.ficial 3.0 - Interface Cibernética showcase at Itaú Cultural until the 24th of September.

Tired of watching plays with the same themes for over a year the authors decided to get together and discuss the type of play they would like to stage. “We thought of matters that interested us, philosophy and the media were some of them” Beto Matos recalls. “We put fragments of things we had already written together and crated a story in which the characters had the same names as the actors and that during their presentation would ask themselves whether they were in a play, a reality show or hypnotized” amuses Matos.

The plot develops from the blind date that Beto and Andréa set up over the internet: two strangers will see each other for the first time and lie about people and tell untrue stories. They are so distressed by the possibility of being caught that they start to add characters that appear casually through the strangest ways to the story. “A real-estate agent, for example, becomes the ‘friend’ that my character takes to the date” says Beto Matos.

In a time where the press is a mixture of real life and fiction for entertainment purposes, and exposes at the same time the anonymous and the notorious, Rubens Velloso the director, brings new technologies to the stage. The audience and characters are involved by means of the dialogue of the actors with the filmed images, live projections and Internet links. Cell phones are used by the cast, the character Beto, chats with his father through the Internet in a room outside the auditorium. “We do not pertain to show various possibilities of media on stage, but use these media to put together a piece with theatrical language”, points out the actor.

The Phila7 Company has always tried to establish an interaction between theatre arts and other areas such as music and technology, Abujamra is responsible for the original soundtrack and the sound effect of the play. “The soundtrack was developed with the idea of taking a highly potential and first class sound to the stage. The idea is that both the cast and the audience are ‘embraced’ by the soundtrack” says Rubens Velloso.

Diário de Marília (newspaper) - February 12th, 2008

Phila 7 Company merges reality and illusion with “OP1”

Within the programming of the ‘Dança Sesi 2007’ the Phila7 Company from São Paulo presents the choreographed play “OP1” in the “Popular do Centro de Atividades Lázaro Ramos Novaes” theatre.

The production is a theatrical experience that has the body, the lights, the video and the music as the main characters, with artistic director Mirella Brandi and the playwright Beto Matos, it allows the audience to perceive the fusion between illusion and reality in a different way.

The production was selected by Itaú Cultural’s “Projeto Rumos Dança” and is also part of the Sesi Dança 2007 project, that selects six other productions throughout 12 other cities of the São Paulo. It also received the “Prêmio Estímulo de Dança 2005” award given by the State of São Paulo/ State Secretary of Culture.

The set is composed by a projection screen at the back and a black linoleum –a non-skid carpet used for dance performances- where the dance solos take place. A camera captures footage of the moving body and is projected on the big screen.

Lali Krotoszynski acts and choreographs the piece, Rodrigo Gontijo is responsible for the videos and the original score is by Fabio Villas Boas. The prize-winning Rubens Velloso and Marcos Azevedo do the consultancy.

The Phila7 Company exists for two years, it branched out of the Brazilian Philharmonic (Cultural Production Company) with the aim of researching new forms of artistic expression and different media. The group is composed of film and theatre professionals that work with the languages convergence.

Phila7 has three other productions, other than “OP1”: “Galileo Galilei”, “Play on Earth” and “A Verdade Relativa da Coisa em Si” – that received the “Funarte Dramaturgia” award in 2005.

Dança Sesi’s 2007 next attraction will happen on the 1st and 7th of September. “Opni – Objeto Poético Não Identificado” by João Paulo Gross will be shown at the Sesi Marília theatre.

The city will also welcome “As Formas Eram Já Mera Ilusão da Vita” with Avoa Núcleo Artístico on the 9th and 8th of September and right after that, ending the season, “Tateando a Noite com os Pés”, with Seis + 1 (six + 1) Dance Company, on the 15th and 16th. All presentations are free of charge. Advanced tickets may be obtained at Sesi, João Ramalho avenue, 1.306.

Folha de São Paulo (newspaper) - September 28th

FEBRE (FEVER)
Play in search of every-day archetypes
By Sergio Salvia Coelho

“Febre” (fever) is a production that takes risks. Initially because of its adjustment to the multimedia area of GAG (Global Art Group).GAG is a vast backyard that since May has pertained to be “a place to unite and spread new forms of contemporary art”. Thus, it includes in its narrative video projections to create a dreamlike universe, but it is not a video-performance
.
Furthermore, it out passes the special effects experiments and proposes an openly symbolic narrative, that is quite similar to the “Dream” by Strindberg. It mixes Alice, Hamlet, Diana (the intense Roberta Youssef), and take us through a journey of family traumas with a poetic verve that sometimes comes out of the synthetic images, but due to the Núcleo Dramax’s charisma all is kept in tune with the taste of the “cool” GAG regulars.

The author and director Marcos Azevedo, is fearless as he exposes his personal wounds, with the aid of his cast to write the play he tries to show the archetypes of the futile urban elite. A little naive, a little airtight, pretentious in a good way, this is a play that aims high and allows mistakes to happen.

"RODA" (Wheel) Project search languages involving body and technology
Festival with dance, performances and installations happens at Global Art Group

ADRIANA PAVLOVA
Folha de São Paulo (newspaper) - December 4th

The intersection of dance with different media and new artistic languages involving the body and technology are the concepts of “RODA", which has the opening day this evening, at the new Global Art Group (GAG) in the neighborhood of Lapa in Sao Paulo. Dancing, videos, installations, performances and debates happens in the headquarters of Phila 7 Company, where was recently performed the play "Fever".

At the opening, there will be a showcase of contemporary Brazilian production about the body, with 16 works and 22 artists from different parts of the country.

A selection signed by curator Maíra Spanghero, Communication and Technology professor of the PUC (Brazilian University), which was guided by the artistic experiences of Lygia Clark, especially the series "Bichos."

"I picked works that depends on a body experience to become reality and actually happen," says Spanghero.
Directly inspired by the plastic artist, dancer Wagner Schwartz presented the video "Bicho", in which a puppy interacts with the hand that manipulates. There will be also the dance performance “Pés Descalços Caminham Calados" of Candice Didonet, the video dance "Jornada ao umbigo do mundo” by Alex Cassal and Alice Ripoll, and "Fragmentos", by the artist Tânia Fraga.
"She [Fraga] presents virtual reality’s worlds projected on the wall, which can only be viewed with 3D glasses," says Maíra Spanghero.

After the debut today, the project "Wheel" will be presented until Saturday with exhibitions and three debates, with artists and theorists. On Friday, for instance, the artist Tania Fraga, a performer Thelma Bonavita and dancer Vera Hall will participate of the debate. Next year, the idea is to distribute financial assistance to artists for the production of new works that uses the body as a media.

RODA PROJECT
When: opening today at 20h; every day, from 14h to 22h, up to 12 /09
Where: GAG – Global Art Group (r. Tito, 79, tel. 3596-3671)
Free entrance.

CLICK HERE TO GO TO BRAZIL WEB SITE: www.playonearth.com.br

CLICK HERE TO GO TO UK WEB SITE: http://www.artsadmin.co.uk/projects/project.php?id=216

Contacts details:

55 11 3596 3671
atendimento@gag.art.br
Rua Tito, 79
São Paulo - SP
05051.000