Workshop created by Brazilian artist revives human connection in the digital age.

Beatriz Bevilaqua, 247 -  In an increasingly fast-paced and digital world, multi-talented artist Mara Braga reclaims the essentials: touch, eye contact, and connection. A singer, actress, composer, and educator, she created the CorpoVoz workshop as a sensitive response to the excess of screens and the lack of genuine connection, especially after the emotional and social impact caused by the pandemic.

Born in Araraquara (SP), Mara graduated in Performing Arts from the State University of Londrina and has been building a multifaceted career that combines music, theater, pedagogy, and body expression. In 2024, she released her first album of original songs. MarAdentroAnd since then she has been touring the state of São Paulo with shows and training workshops. But it is with CorpoVoz, a methodology developed from her own artistic research, that she found her entrepreneurial path.

“Being an artist is being an entrepreneur. When we create a method based on personal experience and share it with the world, we are being entrepreneurial. It is an art that is born from the body and transforms into a profession,” Braga summarizes.

CorpoVoz does not separate vocal technique from the body in motion. For Mara, the two are inseparable and together reveal the expressive power of the human being. The workshop has been applied in cultural institutions such as SESC, as well as in schools, artistic collectives, and companies.

“When we gain body awareness, we expand our inner spaces. And this is reflected in the way we express ourselves, relate to others, and position ourselves in the world,” she explains.

The methodology blends somatic practices, psychology, improvisation, and vocal techniques, the result of years of study with masters such as Wagner Barbosa and Tiago Kaltenbacher. The focus is on awakening listening, observation, and presence: capacities affected by technological hyperconnectivity and intensely shaken during the isolation of the pandemic.

Entrepreneurship as a means of survival and freedom.

Mara's entrepreneurial journey also stems from motherhood. Faced with her son's diagnosis of a severe food allergy, she had to leave formal employment and reinvent her source of income. That's when art and education came together as a possible path.

"For many women, entrepreneurship is not a choice but a necessity. But it is also a possibility for freedom. To shape their own time, to live from what resonates within them," she says.

The artist also leads the band. Diabaria, with carnival and tropicalist reinterpretations, and performs original shows, wedding performances, and educational projects. Between 2018 and 2023, she also ran an e-commerce business, an experience that taught her about the challenges and limitations of digital entrepreneurship.

“Entrepreneurship is a rollercoaster. I've wanted to give up. But I realized that my core is in art. And even that is entrepreneurship. It's about seeking paths with autonomy and truth,” she says.

The role of the artist in the world of machines.

Reflecting on the future of art in the face of artificial intelligence and automation, Mara is emphatic that nothing replaces the in-person human experience. “During the pandemic, live streams lost their impact. Because what connects us is the present moment, the ephemeral, being together. The role of the artist is to evoke emotion, to provoke, to awaken senses that no machine will ever reach,” she believes.

For her, theater, live music, and workshops like CorpoVoz have a fundamental role: to re-humanize daily life. “We live in an era where babies know how to use cell phones before they can talk. But there are still children who need affection, to be listened to, to be present. The artist is that channel between the sensitive and the world,” she explained.

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