Helena Araújo — and it gets better

and it gets better is a solo by Helena Araújo that uses humour, disobedience and cabaret flamboyance elements to expose the rocky pressures of the performing arts market.

The audience is invited to a fake DIY beach that shines a warm spotlight on the mental health of artists in the performance world. Helena rides the toxic waves in the art market, challenging the underrepresentation of precarious working conditions, incessant travels, and harsh criticism in the field. Or is it a beach? While sitting on a lounge chair, reading her red flags or maybe fighting off sharks, she shares intimate stories and secret anxieties. For example, those messages that she needs to reply promptly about an email that was sent an hour ago.

At this beach, the atmosphere varies from stormy to breezy to glittery and the emotions squirt unapologetically, splash, splash, splash! The shoreline gets moisturised and the visitors might get wet and salty. And it gets better! Helena challenges the general mindset of the more you do, the more valuable you are as an artist by trying to do nothing. She fails, she tries again, she fails...it is not easy to be a working class freelancer. Oh gush gush, Helena is still looking for ways to cope with the burns and she will not give up that soon.

about

Helena Araújo is a femme maker and performer from Rio de Janeiro, based in between Vienna and Brussels. A lover of plot twists, kitsch, and bad jokes, she creates spaces where artistic languages intertwine and challenge conventional expectations. She moves fluidly between contemporary art spaces and the feverous energy of cabaret nights. Her work has been shown at Studio Brut (AT), Radiant Nights Festival (BE), CPA Festival (AT), Moving Futures Festival (NL), and more. As a performer, she has collaborated with artists like Ivo Dimchev, Renan Martins, Ulduz Ahmadzadeh, Elizabeth Ward, Pedra Tejnorova and Martin Talaga. In 2024, she was part of PARASOL, received a DanceWeb scholarship and the BMKMWS Startstipendium (AT), and premiered and it gets better at Studio Brut (AT). Recently, she has worked with Akemi Takeya and now is touring with and it gets better.

Helena has also been working as a dance and performance improvisation teacher. She has shared her practice in different places such as CAMPO (BE), Masters at AP School of Arts, DeSingel (BE), Fontys Academy of Circus and Performance Art (NL), Dansverkstaedid (IS), University of Arts in Iceland (IS) and Espaço Mova (BR).

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