WHEN THE BACKYARD BECOMES A STAGE, AND THE STAGE BECOMES A BACKYARD:
flower memories, Selvagem memories
14 april 2026
Since his childhood, the Colombian dancer and choreographer Maurício Florez has carried a desire in his name: to be a flower. It is by recounting this aspiration that his piece “Memórias para se transformar em flor” [Memories to become flower] begins. And since its premiere in 2024, it has been transforming various Brazilian stages. The piece is inspired by the pitanga tree in his backyard, his classes at the Escola de Botânica [School of Botany], and content from Selvagem, which he has been participating closely for many years. It premiered in São Paulo and, like plants, has been winding and intertwining its way through festivals and cultural spaces, also integrating different SESC circuits. In March 2026, the play arrived at SESC Copacabana in Rio de Janeiro, presenting a forest of personal and collective memories, human and non-human.
In a way, “Selvagem notebooks permeates all memories,” he said. It all began during the pandemic, in São Paulo, when Maurício started paying closer attention to the nature in his backyard and participating in the Botany School and Selvagem’s study groups, where he began as a communications volunteer. Faced with social isolation and all the tragedies linked to the COVID-19 pandemic, he started to observe the vines spreading, the flowers turning into fruit, and the growth of every leaf in the garden, exploring new ways of engaging with this world. Inspired by Vladimir Vernadsky’s words, featured in the Selvagem Biosfera [Biosphere]notebook, about how we can perceive shapes and colors but often lack the mechanisms to feel them, Maurício began experimenting with ways of being plant.
Memories on the stage. Photo: Guilherme Miranda.
In “Memories to become flower,” 16 memories are arranged on stage, and Maurício invites the audience to evoke between 7 and 8 of them in whatever order they prefer. These are memories about plants, mythologies, and the idea of metamorphosing the body into a flower, drawing on elements from the artist’s journey to explore the many intersections, interactions, and lessons between humans and plants throughout world history – and his own.
As part of his creative process, he wrote a letter to the pitanga tree in his backyard, which eventually became the Selvagem “Dance and the plot of metamorphosis" notebook, written from the memories of the dance workshop Metamorphoses of the Body , which he offered to the Selvagem community in October 2022. The influence of Anderson Santos, from the School of Botany, was also fundamental in enabling the artist to practice how the relationship with nature is capable of changing people’s lives.
The disconnection between humans and other living beings appears in the speeches of scientists as well as Indigenous leaders and thinkers. How, then, can we restore this bond? There are many answers, but Maurício’s preferred one stemmed from the metamorphosis, the central theme of “Memories to become flower”. According to him, through metamorphosis it becomes possible to create a body that not only imagines, but also seeks to feel the rich and refined processes that take place within plants. Processes that call for calm and rest, yet never cease.
Photos: Danielle Satiko.
Through observation and experimentation he studied these processes and gave rise to the play’s choreography, in which, just like flowers, Maurício creates movements in relationship with light and gravity. Citing the Selvagem Regenerantes de Gaia [Regenerants of Gaia]cycle, the artist explained how he was inspired by the way plants move while at rest and rest while in motion, as well as by the ability of flowers to fly while remaining on the ground. Inhabiting the ground through their roots and the sky through their stems, plants participate in two worlds: one bathed in light and the other cradled by darkness.
Maurício’s drawings document the physical practices of the body’s metamorphosis.
Together with other references for the play is a heart inside a glass dome, a statue kneeling on beans, a plant mask, and a box with the butoh dance, along with the Selvagem notebooks “Algumas coisas que aprendi com Lynn Margulis” [Some things I learned from Lynn Margulis], “Propiocepção: quando o ambiente se torna corpo” [Proprioception: when the environment becomes body], “Plantas como cérebros” [Plants as brains], “Aspectos da inteligência das plantas” [Aspects of plant intelligence], “Pytun Jera: night blossoming”, alongside the books “Metamorphoses” by Emanuele Coccia, “Symbiotic Planet” by Lynn Margulis, “Biosphere” by Vladimir Vernadsky, “Regenerants of Gaia” by Fabio Scarano, and “Before, there were no world” by Umusï Pãrõkumu (Firmiano Arantes Lana) and Tõrãmü Këhíri (Luiz Gomes Lana). These books inspire not only Maurício but Selvagem’s studies in general, and are part of a constellation of publications by Dantes Editora that, on stage, are passed from hand to hand among those who let themselves be captivated by curiosity, but can also be accessed here.
Books, Selvagem notebooks and other memories. Photo: Maurício Florez.
Created originally without dialogue, just dance, “Memories to become flower” incorporated spoken words by Maurício’s desire to speak about the transformations and lessons learned from flowers even before they unfolded through the movements of his body. For the artist, the play’s purpose is to find a simple translation for complex concepts, such as mathematical and chemical formulas, transforming them into sensations that speak to everyone. Through memories that, in Maurício’s words, are “capable of touching the heart without losing scientific rigor,” the piece creates a narrative in which life and science become silence, slowness, and patience, as well as stories about plant intelligence, which, for many audiences, remains an unfamiliar topic.
In addition to other reference materials, the artist cited the Selvagem notebooks “Biosphere, anthropocene and amerindian animism”, “Yepamahsã: complementarity and transformation”, “The sun and the flower”, “A life drawing trees”, “Manifest of a ‘weed”, “Memory does not burn”, and “Cosmic web” for those interested in delving deeper into this plant-based universe.
By showing how the plant world is also enchanted, the play uses storytelling as an invitation to perceive how life unfolds beyond the human realm, and becomes a guide for each of us to find within ourselves the possibility of blossoming.
Being part of creating experiences like this is a great joy for Selvagem, and an even greater satisfaction is receiving feedback like that from Maurício and others who participate in the study cycles, engage with the materials, and become multipliers of this collaborative network. If you’re interested in learning more about the play and the workshop that accompanies it, you can contact Maurício Florez via email at infomauricioflorez@gmail.com or on his Instagram @mauricio.florez_. And if you’d like to share an activity that you’ve created using Selvagem materials, we invite you to share it with us using this form. . Not only does this bring us great joy, but this feedback is also very important to follow the impact of Selvagem materials around the world.
May “Memories to become flower” be just the beginning of a beautiful journey, and may it continue to blossom in more and more people and flourish on more and more stages!