Navalha na Carne, by Àkila a.k.a. Puta da Silva, is the winning project of the 9th edition of the Amélia Rey Colaço Grants, an initiative promoted by Teatro Nacional D. Maria II (Lisbon), A Oficina / Centro Cultural Vila Flor (Guimarães), O Espaço do Tempo (Montemor-o-Novo), and Teatro Viriato (Viseu), with the aim of supporting the production of performances by young artists and emerging companies, both national and foreign residents in Portugal.

Àkila a.k.a. Puta da Silva is a Brazilian singer, performer, filmmaker, and artistic director based in Lisbon since 2016. Holding a degree in Theatre from the Federal University of Uberlândia and a Master’s degree in Theatre and Community from the Lisbon Theatre and Film School, she develops a practice that articulates performance music, theatre, and audiovisual media as devices for artistic research and cultural mediation. Her work has circulated in more than three countries and has been presented in over 40 festivals, cultural institutions, and institutional contexts. Her audiovisual work has been screened at more than ten international festivals and awarded at the Black Queer Festival, MVF Awards, Bogotá Music Video Festival, Luminosa Mostra, and LISBIFF. She participated in the Venice Biennale (2022) with the film Vampires in Space, representing Portugal, and as a performer in the work Water Is Coming. She was also part of the cast of the TV series Cacau (TVI), broadcasted in more than 90 countries. As a creator and stage director, she directed the performances Benedites (Cia. Ocupa Teatro) and Clarisse (Cia. Acazô), and served as general director of the cultural movement Olho da Rua. In this project, she assumes artistic and general direction.

Navalha na Carne proposes a contemporary reconfiguration of Plínio Marcos’ classic, revisiting the work through the lens of new migrant dramaturgies in Portugal. Directed by Àkila a.k.a. Puta da Silva, the performance places Black and dissident bodies under tension in a tenement room where economic deprivation dictates the rules. Between the housing crisis and the restriction of rights, the creation exposes contemporary mechanisms of social exclusion and structural violence, transforming the stage into a space of political intervention and aesthetic confrontation.

The prize awarded to the winning project of the Amélia Rey Colaço Grant consists of a monetary award of €25,000, in addition to access to several artistic residencies and the possibility of presenting the performance at the four partner theatres of the grant. For this 9th edition of the Amélia Rey Colaço Grant, 61 applications were received and evaluated by a jury composed of Pedro Penim (Artistic Director of Teatro Nacional D. Maria II), Sofia Campos (Board Member of Teatro Nacional D. Maria II), Pedro Barreiro (Artistic Director of O Espaço do Tempo), Patrícia Carvalho (Executive Director of O Espaço do Tempo), Bruno dos Reis (Director of Teatro Oficina and Theatre Programmer at Centro Cultural Vila Flor), Marta Silva (Department of Heritage and Traditional Arts – A Oficina), António M. Cabrita (Programming Director of Teatro Viriato), and Maria João Rochete (Programming Assistant at Teatro Viriato).

Created in 2018, the Amélia Rey Colaço Grants has already supported the creation of eight performances by young artists: Parlamento Elefante, by Eduardo Molina, João Pedro Leal, and Marco Mendonça (2018); Aurora Negra, by Cleo Diára, Isabél Zuaa, and Nádia Yracema (2019); Ainda estou aqui, by Tiago Lima (2020); Another Rose, by Sofia Santos Silva (2021); As Três Irmãs, by Tita Maravilha (2022); POPULAR, by Sara Inês Gigante (2023); Corre, bebé!, by Ary Zara and Gaya de Medeiros (2024); and TOSHiiB4 (2025), by Luísa Guerra, which will be presented from 27 to 31 May at Sala Estúdio Valentim de Barros, in the Bombarda Gardens, Lisbon. Following this presentation, the performance will be shown on 12 June at Centro Cultural Vila Flor, in Guimarães; on 20 June at Teatro Viriato, in Viseu; and on 4 and 5 September at O Espaço do Tempo, in Montemor-o-Novo.