Lux Boreal Brings Baja California’s Dance Creation to the Final of the 2026 Guillermo Arriaga National Dance Award

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Burdel filosófico, by Henry Torres Blanco, was one of eight works selected for the national competition’s final. Harold Albert García Sandoval received the award for Best Lighting Design.

Tijuana, Baja California, September 2026. Contemporary dance company Lux Boreal represented Baja California in the final of the 2026 Guillermo Arriaga National Dance Award—the 43rd INBAL-UAM Contemporary Choreography Competition—with Burdel filosófico, directed and choreographed by Henry Torres Blanco.

Organized by Mexico’s Ministry of Culture and the National Institute of Fine Arts and Literature (INBAL), through its National Dance Coordination, in collaboration with the Metropolitan Autonomous University (UAM), the competition brought together creators, performers, and artistic teams from across the country over five days.

The 2026 edition held special significance as it coincided with the centennial of choreographer Guillermo Arriaga’s birth and the 80th anniversary of INBAL. Of the 72 submissions received, 29 were selected for the preliminary rounds, held August 26–30 at the Guillermina Bravo Dance Theater in the Centro Cultural del Bosque.

Burdel filosófico was presented on Sunday, August 30, in Category A, for established artists. At the conclusion of the preliminary rounds, the jury selected eight works from Baja California, Mexico City, Querétaro, Sinaloa, Veracruz, and Yucatán to perform in the final on September 1 at the main auditorium of the Palace of Fine Arts.

Reaching this stage placed Lux Boreal among the featured works in Mexico’s contemporary choreography scene and brought an artistic perspective developed along the northern border into one of the country’s most important dance gatherings.

Five Bodies Facing the Gaze

Inspired by Pablo Picasso’s 1907 painting Les Demoiselles d’Avignon, Burdel filosófico takes the five figures depicted in the painting as a starting point for creating a stage world inhabited by beings whose identities remain open and shifting.

The work does not seek to reproduce the painting literally. Through movement, it imagines the fantastic, unreal, and possible stories that might exist behind these five bodies. The characters confront one another, form alliances, reject one another, and meet again, gradually shaping a collective entity of a feminine nature.

In this space, gender is no longer a fixed boundary. Each performer contributes to a shared presence shaped by desire, exposure, belonging, and the need to preserve autonomy. The work also reflects on the gaze: who observes, who is observed, and how a body can resist being reduced to an image.

The cast included Gabriela Iraís Amaro Salgado, Emiliano Castro de la Cruz, Claudia Pamela Ríos Castro, Leo Aldair Huerta Arroyo, and Claudia Gabriela Mendoza Velázquez. The music used in the work is by Davidson Jaconello.

Henry Torres Blanco was responsible for the direction, choreography, and costume design, while Ángel Arámbula, Lux Boreal’s director, supported the rehearsal process and helped refine the movement language. The costumes were made by Luz María Serrano.

Recognition for Lighting Design

Lux Boreal’s participation also received the award for Best Lighting Design, presented to Harold Albert García Sandoval for his work on Burdel filosófico.

The lighting design was a central element of the production. It brought the fragmentation, contrasts, and multiple points of view associated with the source painting into the stage space. Rather than simply accompanying the movement, the lighting transformed the audience’s perception of the performers and helped shape the work’s atmosphere, tension, and visual architecture.

This recognition underscores the collaborative nature of stage creation and brings visibility to the contributions of the artists and designers whose work is integral to building a production’s artistic vision.

The Importance of Coming Together

For Lux Boreal, a Tijuana-based company, taking part in the Guillermo Arriaga National Dance Award meant more than competing. It offered the opportunity to bring an artistic practice shaped at the border into dialogue with different generations, languages, and approaches to contemporary dance.

Gatherings like this allow artists to compare processes, recognize the different conditions under which dance is produced across regions, and strengthen ties among performers, choreographers, designers, educators, and production teams. They also create space for the dance community to reflect on itself, recognize shared ground and differences, and consider the present and future of the field.

Burdel filosófico’s selection for the final was the result of the shared work of the performers, artists, collaborators, and Lux Boreal team members who made the creative process, technical preparation, and journey from Tijuana to Mexico City possible.

Through this participation, Lux Boreal reaffirms its commitment to the creation, research, and touring of contemporary dance, and to representing Baja California within Mexico’s performing arts landscape. Being part of the Guillermo Arriaga Award meant sharing a work, but also coming together, recognizing one another, and actively contributing to the ongoing conversation shaping Mexican dance.

Credits for Burdel filosófico

Direction and choreography: Henry Torres Blanco

Performers: Gabriela Iraís Amaro Salgado, Emiliano Castro de la Cruz, Claudia Pamela Ríos Castro, Leo Aldair Huerta Arroyo, and Claudia Gabriela Mendoza Velázquez

Lighting design: Harold Albert García Sandoval

Costume design: Henry Torres Blanco

Costume construction: Luz María Serrano

Music: Davidson Jaconello

Rehearsal support and movement-language review: Ángel Arámbula

Production: Lux Boreal

Imagen por: ISÓPTICA AF