Luz Arcas

Luz Arcas
Born
María Luz Arcas López

1983 (age 42–43)
Málaga, Spain
Occupations
  • Dancer
  • choreographer
  • stage director

María Luz Arcas López (born 1983), known as Luz Arcas, is a Spanish dancer, choreographer and stage director who founded the contemporary dance company La Phármaco in 2009. She received the El Ojo Crítico dance award in 2015 and Spain's National Dance Award for Creation in 2024, the latter after completing the trilogies Bekristen: Tríptico de la prosperidad and Ciclo de los milagros.

Early life and training

Arcas was born in Málaga in 1983, studied choreography and performance at the Conservatorio Superior María de Ávila and stage direction at the Real Escuela Superior de Arte Dramático in Madrid, and trained in flamenco, classical Indian dance and contemporary dance in Brussels, Amsterdam and Berlin; she founded La Phármaco in 2009.

Early career

In 2018 Arcas and Abraham Gragera created Una gran emoción política for the Centro Dramático Nacional, based on María Teresa León's autobiography Memoria de la melancolía; it premiered at Madrid's Teatro Valle-Inclán on 26 September with 13 dancers, actors and musicians.

Mariana and Todas las santas

Arcas's book Pensé que bailar me salvaría was published in 2022, the year she premiered Mariana at the Seville Flamenco Biennial and Todas las santas at the Cádiz Ibero-American Theatre Festival. Based on the lives of Salvadoran performers Egly Larreynaga and Alicia Chong, Todas las santas was Arcas's first stage work to give text a central role and used their stories to ask who is sanctified and who deserves that status.

In Mariana, Arcas performs as the sole dancer alongside five musicians and uses female working animals in Andalusian culture to examine labour, dependency and violence; she described the physical language as cuerpo jondo, an internal and hybrid form developed without using a mirror. Writing for Tanz International, Arnd Wesemann described her work as drawing on regional dance traditions and transposing them into the present. In 2023 she directed Sarah Kane's 4.48 Psychosis at the Teatro Español, with Natalia Huarte as the sole performer in a staging centred on a bed, medication and a sink.

Bekristen and Ciclo de los milagros

Arcas developed Bekristen: Tríptico de la prosperidad over five years through La domesticación (2019), Somos la guerra (2021) and La buena obra (2023), presenting the nearly three-hour trilogy at Teatros del Canal during the 41st Festival de Otoño. Its title means 'Christians' in Fang, and the final piece used eight performers aged between 60 and 80, many of them non-professionals, to address the abandonment of elderly people in care homes during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Arcas grouped Toná, Trilla and Mariana in Ciclo de los milagros and presented the three works together at Teatro de la Abadía in March 2025; Trilla, her collaboration with the musician Le Parody, combines folk and electronic music.

Later work

Arcas presented La cosa y la fuerza with Rafael SM Paniagua, a response to Goya's print series The Disasters of War and Simone Weil's account of force in the Iliad. Tierras raras premiered at Teatros del Canal on 30 May 2025 during the Madrid en Danza festival, with Arcas dancing alongside La Merce, Danielle Mesquita, Javiera Paz and Raquel Sánchez, and singing by Perrate.

Morphine premiered at Teatro de la Abadía in January 2026 as a solo combining Andalusian ritual, popular Mediterranean religious culture, family memory and the writing of Emmy Hennings. The 55-minute work used dramaturgy by Pedro G. Romero and took its title from a Hennings poem; its three sections move from pendulum-like gestures to a table owned by Arcas's great-great-uncle and a final mirror.

In May 2026 the Spanish National Dance Company premiered Masa, Arcas's work for 23 dancers based on Elias Canetti's Crowds and Power, as part of the double bill Struere at Centro de Danza Matadero. Writing in eldiario.es, Pablo Caruana Húder described Masa as a study of the collective body in which movement and energy pass between dancers, and noted Arcas's rejection of conventional ballet shapes.

Awards

Arcas's earlier prizes include Injuve and Málaga Crea in 2009, the El Ojo Crítico dance award and the Lorca best female dance performer award in 2015, and the 2023 Godot Award for best dance production for Mariana; she was a finalist for best female dance performer at the Premios Max in 2017 and 2022. In 2024 she won the National Dance Award for Creation, a €30,000 prize awarded by Spain's Ministry of Culture.

References

  1. ↑ Castellano, Ángeles (7 October 2024). "Luz Arcas y Lorena Nogal, Premios Nacionales de Danza en las modalidades de creación e interpretación" [Luz Arcas and Lorena Nogal, National Dance Awards in the creation and performance categories]. El Periódico de España (in Spanish). Retrieved 12 November 2026.
  2. ↑ "Lorena Nogal y Luz Arcas, Premios Nacionales de Danza 2024" [Lorena Nogal and Luz Arcas, 2024 National Dance Awards]. Ministerio de Cultura (in Spanish). 7 October 2024. Retrieved 12 November 2026.
  3. ↑ "Luz Arcas, bailarina y coreógrafa, Premio El Ojo Crítico de RNE de Danza" [Luz Arcas, dancer and choreographer, RNE El Ojo Crítico Dance Award]. RTVE (in Spanish). 28 October 2015. Retrieved 12 November 2026.
  4. ↑ "Bailar la memoria histórica (aunque duela)" [Dancing historical memory (even when it hurts)]. El País (in Spanish). 19 September 2018. Retrieved 12 November 2026.
  5. ↑ "La coreógrafa que se atrevió a preguntar qué le hace un país a un cuerpo" [The choreographer who dared to ask what a country does to a body]. eldiario.es (in Spanish). 24 October 2022. Retrieved 12 November 2026.
  6. ↑ Burgos, Rafa (10 November 2022). "Una premiada actualización de los cuentos de pubertad femenina centra la Muestra de Teatro de Alicante" [An award-winning update of female puberty tales takes centre stage at the Alicante Theatre Showcase]. El País (in Spanish). Retrieved 12 November 2026.(subscription required)
  7. ↑ "La mula, la cabra, la yegua: el tributo animal de amor y violencia de la bailarina Luz Arcas" [The mule, the goat, the mare: dancer Luz Arcas's animal tribute of love and violence]. El País (in Spanish). 15 April 2023. Retrieved 12 November 2026.(subscription required)
  8. ↑ Wesemann, Arnd. "Deep Dive 9 dance protagonists with excellent prospects". Der Theaterverlag. Retrieved 12 November 2026.
  9. ↑ "La insoportable actualidad de Sarah Kane y su obra 'Psicosis 4.48'" [The unbearable relevance of Sarah Kane and her play 'Psicosis 4.48']. eldiario.es (in Spanish). 11 June 2023. Retrieved 12 November 2026.
  10. ↑ Caballero, Mercedes L. (8 December 2023). "Luz Arcas o cómo sacudir la escena con la violencia de la verdad" [Luz Arcas, or how to shake the stage with the violence of truth]. El País (in Spanish). Retrieved 12 November 2026.(subscription required)
  11. ↑ Caruana Húder, Pablo (27 November 2023). "Luz Arcas mira de frente a los ancianos abandonados en las residencias en su última obra de danza" [Luz Arcas looks directly at elderly people abandoned in care homes in her latest dance work]. eldiario.es (in Spanish). Retrieved 12 November 2026.
  12. ↑ "Luz Arcas presenta en La Abadía su 'Ciclo de los milagros'" [Luz Arcas presents her 'Ciclo de los milagros' at La Abadía]. Teatro de la Abadía (in Spanish). 14 March 2025. Retrieved 12 November 2026.
  13. ↑ "El Centro Cultural Mirador del Carmen acogerá el espectáculo 'La cosa y la fuerza' de la bailarina y coreógrafa malagueña Luz Arcas" [The Mirador del Carmen Cultural Centre will host 'La cosa y la fuerza' by Málaga dancer and choreographer Luz Arcas]. Ayuntamiento de Estepona (in Spanish). Retrieved 12 November 2026.
  14. ↑ Caballero, Mercedes L. (31 May 2025). "'Tierras raras' o cómo bailar el final de las cosas" ['Tierras raras', or how to dance the end of things]. El País (in Spanish). Retrieved 12 November 2026.(subscription required)
  15. ↑ "Luz Arcas estrena 'Morphine' en Teatro de La Abadía, un "solísimo" de danza "repleto de muertos, espiritismo y rituales"" [Luz Arcas premieres 'Morphine' at Teatro de La Abadía, a dance solo filled with death, spiritualism and rituals]. Europa Press (in Spanish). 13 January 2026. Retrieved 12 November 2026.
  16. ↑ "Luz Arcas: la bailarina médium o cómo invocar a los muertos a través de la danza" [Luz Arcas: the dancer as medium, or how to invoke the dead through dance]. El País (in Spanish). 16 January 2026. Retrieved 12 November 2026.(subscription required)
  17. ↑ "Luz Arcas marca el paso (y un hito) en la Compañía Nacional de Danza" [Luz Arcas sets the pace and a milestone at the Spanish National Dance Company]. El País (in Spanish). 27 May 2026. Retrieved 12 November 2026.(subscription required)
  18. ↑ Caruana Húder, Pablo (28 May 2026). "Luz Arcas pone patas arriba la Compañía Nacional de Danza abriéndose por fin a la contemporánea" [Luz Arcas turns the Spanish National Dance Company upside down as it finally opens up to contemporary dance]. eldiario.es (in Spanish). Retrieved 12 November 2026.
  19. ↑ "Lorena Nogal y Luz Arcas ganan los Premios Nacionales de Danza de 2024" [Lorena Nogal and Luz Arcas win the 2024 National Dance Awards]. El País (in Spanish). 7 October 2024. Retrieved 12 November 2026.(subscription required)
  20. ↑ "La coreógrafa malagueña Luz Arcas galardonada con el Premio Nacional de Danza 2024" [Málaga choreographer Luz Arcas awarded the 2024 National Dance Prize]. Cadena SER (in Spanish). 8 October 2024. Retrieved 12 November 2026.