La Jornada: “Mimes are more alive than ever”

Contemporary mime, larval masks and body language will meet today in pampering for youpresentation dedicated to Juan Gabriel Moreno, central figure of pantomime in Mexico and teacher of several generations.

The activity, at the Sergio Magaña Theater, will bring together performers trained in different techniques and currents. For Humberto Ibarra, director of the project, the intention is to show the breadth of a language that is usually reduced to stereotypes associated with painted faces and invisible walls.

“We want them to know the communication possibilities of the body,” he explained in an interview with The Day. “Mime is the body awareness of any performing artist.”

Ibarra recalled meeting Moreno in 1983 during a national exhibition organized by José Solé behind the Centro Cultural del Bosque. The definitive impression came from watching him perform Resurrection.

“It was precise, exact. In a scene called The Globero you could see the color of the balloons and the child’s face. There I understood that it was the most important mime in Mexico.”

Years later he saw Marcel Marceau perform for the first time. “Marceau was far from the precision of Juan Gabriel Moreno.”

Alaida Ibarra, trained at the Dimitri Theater School in Switzerland, will participate; Mariana Cortés Lima, linked to contemporary mime in Argentina and Spain; Rafael Degar, founder of Teatro Súbito and dedicated to working with masks; Dago, known as “the mime of Tlalpan”; Osvaldo Roberto García, linked to clown corporal, and Humberto Ibarra himself.

Each performer will present independent fragments of their repertoire. The director pointed out that the program presents an emotional journey built from different atmospheres and styles, without developing a linear narrative.

Ibarra also highlighted the stage return of Rafael Degar after the recent death of Patricia, actress, co-founder of Teatro Súbito and life partner of the artist. “It is the first function after this duel.”

Throughout the conversation, he insisted on the importance of recovering body awareness within the performing arts and questioned the loss of spaces dedicated to physical work in schools and universities.

“The body is the origin of everything. Before we speak, we first move. I can’t get on stage if my body doesn’t know what it’s going to transmit.”

For the director, the evening also represents a moment of comeback for the art of mime in Mexico. “Today I can say that we mimes are more alive than ever.”

pampering for you It takes place today at 8 p.m. at the Sergio Magaña Theater, located at Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz 114, Santa María la Ribera neighborhood, Mexico City. Admission is free.