Trama is a dance film that explores the deep significance of hair as a vessel of identity,memory, and transformation. The film moves through intimate gestures and embodied rituals to reflect on the tenderness, beauty, and complexity carried within our strands.
Hair carries our stories, much like the rings of a tree; each strand records our histories — our environments, our nourishment, our experiences. This film asks: What happens to the hair we lose each day? What traces of us remain woven into the world? As an immigrant, I’m always yearning for home. My practice is deeply shaped by the grief of being away, the joy of returning, and the enduring love I carry with me wherever I go. I find home in the Latinx diasporic community I’m part of — in my friends, in the language, and in the warmth that surrounds us. I return home through traditional practices, sounds, and stories that connect me to my roots.
Through dance, Trama reveals hair as both a root and a thread — binding us to our ancestors, our land, and the unseen stories that persist long after we are gone. In my family, the act of braiding another’s hair is a gesture of care and tenderness, an everyday ritual that carries generations of meaning.
My personal journey of letting my hair grow and playing with it has become an extension of my creative process — a way to express, heal, and transform. It mirrors how identity and belonging are constantly evolving, and how through movement and ritual, we can reweave our connections to home, memory, and self.
Gabriela Garcia is a Mexican emerging dance artist based on Treaty 1 territory. She ́s one of the founders of Miradorx Art Collective, formed by Latinx women and queer artists based in the Canadian prairies.
Gabriela holds a B.A in dance through the Theatre and Film department of the University of Winnipeg and the School of Contemporary Dancers. Gabriela has shared her work in Canada and Mexico through different organizations like: Free Flow Dance Theatre, Foro Libre, Nuit Blanche Winnipeg, New Dance Horizons and Winnipeg Film Group.
Gabriela has been honored to work with Alejandro Ronceria, Kyra Green, Gaile Petursson-Hiley, Aria Evans to mention a few. She has been a continuous collaborator and guest artist with The Mariachi Ghost Music Band. In 2022 Gabriela was part of the Intercultural Indigenous Choreographic Lab cohort at Banff Centre. Gabriela is the recipient of the "Talentos" scholarship provided by the Mexican government and the first BIPOC emerging artist scholarship provided by Healthy Dancer Canada.
Dance film realized with the support of Young Lungs Dance Exchange, under the mentorship of Natalie Baird and Toby Gillies.
