Who is MamaCoatl?

MamaCoatl is a San Francisco based songstress, poet, performance activist, and spiritual healer who comes from the Yaqui people of the Sonora desert. She has lived and worked in the Mission district exploring sound, ritual and cultural activism as power sources for public health for the last decade.  

As a performer she has worked stages from the US West Coast to the Heart of the Andes, in genres as diverse as Performance Art and Installation to Butoh, Ritual, Musical Theater, and Cabaret. Among the projects she has collaborated on are Rwanda Women’s stories of survival with ABD Dance Company, and Spiritus Migratorius with La Mama de Bogotá School of Theater for San Francisco International Festival. She has shared the stage with Bay Area poets Judy Grahn and Nina Serrano, musicians Holly Near and Linda Tillery. 

As a Ritualist, she has curated ceremonies to heal the Amazon River Mother of God at the border of Bolivia-Brazil-Peru, concerts for peace on places desecrated by femicide in Mexico’s highways and organized blessing days in city corners and public plazas in San Francisco. These actions of occupying public space, reclaiming public mourning and atoning with nature are experiences created at the borderlines of culture, where performance art ends up in ceremony, where healing takes place in the most unlikely places, this is where her work takes root. 

In 2006 MamaCoatl brought her International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women and Girls community event to San Francisco after performances in Mexico and Peru. The event has become a yearly celebration of healing and nonviolence including sixteen days of action, healing and education in the community. This annual event begins with a press conference and the reading of the official Mayoral proclamation of November 25^th as San Francisco’s International Day for Eliminating Violence and continues with a street rally, plus a festival of women’s voices at Dance Mission Theater and a variety of healing and educational activities.

In 2005 She released her debut album Border Crossing Diosa, a collection of bilingual poems, songs, and sound art with a sharp feminist political edge. This album was released on November 25^th 2005, at Mexico City Zocalo City Square for an audience of 40 thousand people. 

MamaKoatl has her M.A. in Women Spirituality/Performance Activism from New College of California and MFA in Creative Inquiry. 

MamaCoatl

2003 When God is Useless, multimedia performance, MA, MFA graduation from New College.

2004 Quien esta Matando a las Mujeres, multimedia performance, Cusco Peru, Atoning with the Mother of God, Puerto Maldonado, border of Peru, Bolivia, and Brazil.

2005 El Camino que se Abre, public intervention to reclaim public space and atone with nature at the where the remains of a murdered woman were found. BorderCrossingDiosa cd release, Mexico City.

2006 First annual International Day for Eliminating Violence against Women and Girls in San Francisco,

Hecho en Califas Festival, La Pena de Berkeley.

2007 San Francisco International Arts Festival with Spiritus Migratorius. Caressing the Border at Flytrap Studio, collaboration with Asian  Voices.

2008 Unsing the Song, with the Rwanda Project, Luna Negra at Mission Cultural Center

2009 The Former World, soundscape collaboration with Theresa Dickinson and ZaZa Dance Theatre

2010 Rosas en el Mar, Women Voices festival at dance Mission Theater

2011 Art residency at Red Poppy Art House, Hijas de su Tierra Madre! Mesoamerican Women singing for the recovery of our Indigenous root.

2012 apprenticeship with the Ajq’Ijab council of Mayan Time Keepers of San Francisco.

Published reviews

““ For those who demand comparison, she’s somewhere between Lila Downs, Ani DiFranco and Nina Simone, incorporating a fearless, feminine rearticulation of trova and spoken word infused with jazz, funk and traditional Mexican sounds.” ”

-Plume Noir, Los Angeles, CA-

““MamaKoatl’s sound carries a unique urban edginess. Her spanglish musical syntax –using spoken word and traditional Latino soundscapes, creates a sassy avant garde sonido--.” ”

-El Tecolote, San Francisco, Ca-

"MamaKoatl from Mexico can sing! Her love for transformative sounds, eloquent songs, spoken word, bilingual blues, jazzmientos, funk ranchero is as wide as her stage persona..."

-Jizo Records-

““At her outstanding debut at La Peña's Hecho en Califas Festival in 2006, MamaKoatl’s stage presence mesmerized the audience who responded with a spontaneous standing ovation.” ”

-LA PEŇA CULTURAL CENTER, Berkeley, CA-

““MamaKoatl’s lovely performance at our art benefit event for Occupy San Francisco, November 23, 2011 was eye opening. She displayed a warm and inviting presence with such great command over the event attendees. Her professionalism, timing and poise made her an impeccable voice at the first official art benefit for Occupy SF. How exciting as we all marked a historical moment for the movement.””

                                                                                              -Nexus ArtReach Project Team-