Sayda G. Trujillo

Sayda Trujillo was born in Montreal and grew up in Canada, Guatemala and the USA. She is an actress, and theatre-maker/educator specializing in voice and movement, as well as devising original physical theatre performances.  Identity and storytelling inspire her personal work, as well as collective work with actors and non-actors.

She has taught at Pace University, Florida International University, Occidental College, Cal State Northridge, CSULB, UCSB, Humboldt State, Ngee Ann Polytechnic and LASALLE College of the Arts in Singapore.  At Dell’Arte International, she developed voice curriculum to complement the three-year MFA in Ensemble Based Physical Theatre.  Sayda is full-time faculty at the California State Summer School for the Arts; and has been a guest/resident artist in theatre programs across the USA including Whitman College, California Institute of the Arts, and Williams College. 


Her performance and teaching experience abroad includes work in Guatemala, Ecuador, Chile, Singapore, Spain, Germany, Colombia, UK, Egypt, India and Palestine with The Freedom Theatre.  Sayda has written and performed four solo shows presented nationally and internationally at theater houses including La Mama, REDCAT, and NYTW. Since 2005 Sayda has volunteered for Clowns Without Borders performing for thousands of children in Latin America and the Middle East and served on the board of directors for four years.

Sayda teaches Voice, Acting, Tai Chi Chuan, Contact Improvisation, Solo Performance and physical theatre forms including Commedia Dell Arte and Clown.  Education: BFA in Acting from the California Institute of the Arts; Diploma in Physical Theatre from Dell’Arte International; MA in Voice Studies from the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama in London.

Sayda's practical research and writing focuses on voice and identity, the integration of voice and movement, and decolonizing actor training and pedagogy. You can access her essay, Liberating Terror published at HowlRound in their Clown and Activism series; and her chapter "Nepantla: lingering in-between to embody our voice" in the book Stages of Reckoning: Antiracist and Decolonial Actor Training published by Routledge.