MATADORA by INSÉKTA
(World Premiere)
Co-produced by Synapse Arts and presented in partnership with Chicago Latino Theatre Alliance’s DESTINOS–9th Chicago International Latino Theater Festival
Thursday, September 24, 2026 at 7:30 p.m.
Friday, September 25, 2026 at 7:30 p.m.
Saturday, September 26, 2026 at 12 noon
Tickets: General Admission ($30); Elder/Industry ($20); Non-Columbia Student Ticket ($10); Free to Columbia College Chicago students.
MATADORA is a world-premiere production by INSÉKTA. This new work of Latine Futurism uses dance and physical theater to construct a new mythology about the power of Latine rage–a force of transformation, divinity, and self-possession. Now in its 9th year, Destinos Festival is dedicated to amplifying Latine voices and stories on stages throughout Chicago showcasing the Latine experience as told by Latine artists from Chicago, across the U.S., and Latin America.
“As a graduate from Columbia College’s dance program, returning to premiere my first full-length work at the Dance Center is an incredible full-circle moment,” says INSÉKTA. “I was deeply impacted by the presenting series as a student and developing artist. Opening the 53rdxx season feels magical and it fuels me for what’s to come in my practice.”
INSÉKTA is the artistic practice of director, choreographer, and performer Camila Rivero Pooley. Their immersive dance, theater, film, and public artworks draw on rich artistic inheritances from Latin American futurism, mythology, lived migration, body horror, and ancestral memory to create physically charged worlds that confront our fragmented identities and the weight of suppressed Latine experiences. Their work has appeared in Physical Theater Festival Chicago, Chicago Trans Movement Festival, DESTINOS Festival, Scratch Night, Synapse Arts New Works, Festival de Artes Escénicas (Lima, Peru) and Experimental Forum (NYC), and has been received the 2026 Chicago Dancemakers Forum's Dance Project Grant, Thodos Dance Chicago's 2026 New Dances / New Horizons, and the 2018 Albert P. Weisman Award from Columbia College Chicago where they received their BFA in Dance.
Banner image above: MATADORA BY INSÉKTA, pictured left to right: Sophie Daker, Lola Jett-Beachley, CJ Triche, photo by Diego Bolivar.
