Marcela Levi (1973, Rio de Janeiro) is a choreographer and performer. She has been active for over 30 years in the field of research-based dance, with works presented at festivals and institutions in Brazil and internationally. She graduated from the Angel Vianna School of Dance (Rio de Janeiro) and was an artist-in-residence at Les Récollets art center (France); at the Artistas en Residencia Programme – Casa Encendida / Aula de Danza (Spain); at Espaço Cultural Azala (Spain); at the ON.OFF Urban Creativity Laboratory, Guimarães 2012 – European Capital of Culture (Portugal); and was a guest artist in the Rio Occupation London programme, part of the London Cultural Olympiad, promoted by SEC-RJ (London). She also received the Batiscafo grant (Cuba)

Her works — Imagem (2002), Massa de sentidos (listed among the ten best dance works of 2004 by O Globo), In-organic (Klauss Vianna Award 2007; Rumos Dança Itaú Cultural Programme; included by the British organization Artsadmin in The Top 40 Illustrated Guide to 2008; cited in the 2008 Yearbook of the German magazine Ballettanz; and listed among the ten best dance works of 2007 by Jornal do Brasil), and Em redor do buraco tudo é beira (supported by Funarte’s 2008 Artistic Creation Grant Programme; selected among the dance highlights of 2009 by O Globo’s critics; awarded the ZKB Recognition Prize / Zürcher Theater Spektakel, Zurich, 2010; and the Procultura Award 2010) — have been presented at numerous festivals and art centres in Brazil, Europe, and Latin America, including Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian (Lisbon), Impulstanz Festival (Vienna), Les Inaccoutumés – Ménagerie de Verre (Paris), In Transit (Berlin), In Presentable (Madrid), Rencontres Chorégraphiques de Seine-Saint-Denis (Paris), Kunstenfestivaldesarts (Brussels), Nottdance (Nottingham), Arnolfini (Bristol), Teatro Solís (Uruguay), COCOA Festival (Buenos Aires), the Ceará International Dance Biennial, Casa França-Brasil, MAM Rio de Janeiro, among others.

In 2010, she founded Improvável Produções, a platform for training, research, and creation, in partnership with Argentine choreographer and performer Lucía Russo, based in Rio de Janeiro. Levi & Russo pursue an artistic direction oriented toward an open and multiple regime of meaning — a polyphonic approach in which different inventive positions intersect within a process that embraces deviation, dissent, and internal differences as a constructive critical force, rather than as self-excluding polarities.

Improvável Produções is responsible for the conception, creation, and production of the dance works Monstrous Nature (2011); Mordedores (2015) — included in O Globo’s list of outstanding dance performances of 2015; Iron Mouth (2016) — included in O Globo’s list of outstanding dance performances of 2018 and nominated for the Cesgranrio Dance Prize in the categories “Best Choreography” and “Best Dancer”; Let It Burn (2017) — included in O Globo’s list of outstanding dance performances of 2017; HARM-ONY (2019), co-produced by the Iberescena Fund and NAVE (Santiago, Chile); grrRoUNd (2021), co-produced by Kunstenfestivaldesarts, Kaaitheater, Julidans, Pact Zollverein, and Something Great; 3 against 2: Psycho Tropics (2023), co-produced by Julidans, Centre Chorégraphique National de Caen en Normandie (within the framework of Accueil-Studio), Sítio Canto da Sabiá, and Something Great; what is the chorus. chorus (2024), a piece commissioned for the 32 dancers of the São Paulo City Ballet; and Out of Frame, nominated for the Rose International Prize at Sadler’s Wells, London (Second Edition, 2027).

The company also created the urban intervention Sandwalk with Me (2012), developed between London and Rio de Janeiro with the support of the Rio de Janeiro State Secretariat of Culture and co-produced by the Panorama Festival 2013; the collective reading Given Words (2021), sponsored by the Municipal Secretariat of Culture of Rio de Janeiro through the Aldir Blanc Law; and the film short, short, long and sometimes short, long, short (2021), co-produced by Panorama Raft.

Improvável’s projects have been co-produced and presented by theaters, festivals, and art centers in Brazil and abroad, including Festival Panorama, Centro NAVE, Kunstenfestivaldesarts, Julidans, Centre Chorégraphique National de Caen, Mercat de les Flors, Passages Transfestival, Théâtre de la Ville, Bienal Sesc de Dança, Festival de Curitiba, Festival d’Automne à Paris, Centro Cultural Gabriela Mistral, Festival Atos de Fala, Queer Zagreb, Tanzquartier, MITbr, JUNTA, Kaserne Basel, FIDCU, among many others. Alongside their creative work, Levi & Russo offer workshops at art centers and universities in Brazil and abroad.

Levi has collaborated with artists Lia Rodrigues, Vera Mantero, Guillermo Gómez-Peña, Laura Erber, Manuel Vason, Cristina Moura, Dani Lima, and Gustavo Ciríaco, among others.