Dela Cruz
ERIC
ACTOR PROFILE
PROFILE
Transdisciplinary Performance maker, Actor, Acting Coach, Dramaturg, Educator
Eric V. Dela Cruz is a transdisciplinary performance maker, acting coach, dramaturg, workshop designer and educator. He is the Founder and Creative Navigator of TAXI Theater, a transdisciplinary collaborative platform exploring innovative storytelling practices by engineering audience experiences through sensorial methodologies. He is also an active senior artist-teacher of the Philippine Educational Theater Association (PETA). Formerly, Eric was an assistant professor in the Department of Speech Communication and Theatre Arts in UP Diliman and a chairperson and faculty of the Theater Arts Program in Benilde.
A licensed physical therapist graduating from the University of Santo Tomas (UST), Eric earned his MA in Theatre from the University of the Philippines Diliman. As actor, he has worked with professional and university-based theater companies in the Philippines and abroad; and has appeared in television, film and commercials. He received training from PETA, Tanghalang Pilipino, GMA Artist Center, Stella Adler Studio of Acting, and Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts (RADA).
Eric also designs and facilitates creative workshops and webinars locally and internationally. He has conducted numerous workshops for artistic development, corporate creative training, psychosocial debriefing and disaster risk reduction. He was sent to Spain in an artist exchange program between PETA and EU Emotive Program to conduct workshops for theater professionals, arts educators and youth leaders. He also co-led an interdisciplinary collaborative workshop in the 2019 Prague Quadrennial, Czech Republic.
His directorial projects include the multisensorial dinner, Tacloban, held at Hotel Benilde, Mulagat, a sensorial theater-in-the-dark production, Musta, a experiential promenade production on the journey from depression to mindfulness, and A/AB/N, a one-act play about a teen living with autism.
He has presented his theatre practice and research in numerous local and international conferences. His co-authored article, Transformative power of spatial memory: an interdisciplinary approach to space as performance, was recently published in the Theatre and Performance Design journal. His current theatre practice on devised, site-based, and sensorial/ experiential performances intersect with his research interests on bioart and sentient performativities, which often overlaps with issues in mental health, disability/ inclusivity and sustainable community development.
