| Program Description | Adriana Hillas is a performer, writer, and teaching artist. As a third culture kid, Adriana grew up moving to a new country every 3 years, including Italy, South Africa, Czech Republic, and Poland. Growing up abroad most of her life, theater was always how she found community. She holds a BA in Theater and Diversity studies and received her MFA in Collaborative Theatre-Making in London in 2018. Questions around identity, where is home, what does it mean to belong, have always been central to my personal work. As part of the Washington DC Capital Fringe Festival, Adriana wrote, performed, and directed a one-woman bilingual show titled, Mamita: Eulogies to the Living, exploring mother-daughter identity knots and inherited grief. In 2020, before the pandemic, Adriana worked with Brooklyn-based Tongue Honey productions on a devised performance residency at Upper Jay Arts Center in the Adirondacks, culminating in a performance for the public. While the pandemic paused a lot of her projects, she was excited to take the stage again this past January as part of Washington Ensemble Theater’s Six Pack Series for new works, sharing a work-in-progress titled, Memorial, remembering the early days of the pandemic, navigating what was lost and transformed. She is currently preparing to work with eSe Teatro on an original play written by Julieta Vitullo.
Adriana is excited to build deeper roots in Seattle, and has worked as a teaching artist with Mode Music and Performing Arts providing theater enrichment classes across 7 public schools in Seattle. For the past 7 years, Adriana has taught performance and writing in public schools and community centers in London, Washington DC, New York. In London, she worked with nonprofessional and professional actors as part of an Edinburgh Fringe Festival debut, helping train them in ensemble skills to create a more cohesive and collaborative company. In Washington DC, Adriana taught improv and theater classes with ArtStream, a nonprofit that provided arts classes to adults with developmental disabilities. Classes culminated in an end of season performance, and also provided experience for students to consider auditioning for the company’s mainstage performance. In collaboration between Imagination Stage and Washington DC’s Summer Youth Employment Program, Adriana also co-taught improv and writing workshops to DC youth and police officers, where stories and perspectives were exchanged in an effort to build spaces that challenged hierarchical dynamics. These workshops were also used as research for a play in development by DC playwright Miriam Gonzales. This experience reinforced the need to make theatrical and artistic spaces relatable, accessible, and useful to the wider community. In New York City, I served as teaching artist with Girl Be Heard and facilitated multiple year-long after-school programs and weekend workshops for young women and non-binary folks in the Bronx and Brooklyn. Utilizing theater games and other artistic practices, I designed student-centered lesson plans where we explored themes of identity, power, and change. My students' work was shared to the public in a mid-year open mic called Unplugged, and in an end of year performance called Staging the Revolution. My experiences in the classroom have taught me the importance of adapting, and learning to engage all students by meeting them where they are and centering joy.
My teaching style is student-centered and also grounded in the 6 pillars of a Brave Space - vulnerability, perspective-taking, lean into fear, critical thinking, examine intentions, and mindfulness. I aim to integrate the interests of my students and amplify their voices, while introducing them to practices that will help them feel more embodied and broaden their consciousness. My classes focus on building a deeper sense of self-awareness, confidence, and joy through improv, ensemble-building, and devised theater practices. I want my students to see theater as a way to build community and share their most authentic self. This is what theater helped teach me and I am grateful to share it with others. |