Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Lucille Amado Aires Guilhon. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Lucille, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Earning a full time living from one’s creative career can be incredibly difficult. Have you been able to do so and if so, can you share some of the key parts of your journey and any important advice or lessons that might help creatives who haven’t been able to yet?

Working with art is never easy, it is a type of journey that looks glamorous from the outside but in reality it’s a lot of hard work. I’ve been living only from my dancing for the past 3 and a half years, and the only reason this is not longer is because Covid lockdown came a month after I quit my full time job to go full time dancing – not the best timing😅😅, but it all worked out at the end.
I believe one of the most important steps to make the possibility of living from my art happen was to make sure I had a solid base before I quit my other job. I’ve seen many people fail to persue the artistic area because they think it will be monetarily rewarding in the first few months. This is not how it works at all. My main field as a dance teacher for example, if you are a new instructor it will take time to build your name, so having no other source of income when you start this career is not the best choice because you will feel pressured very quickly, and if not enough people show up to your classes that will affect your income and basically make you feel like you’re failing.
It is a process and takes time, for me it took one year to have 4 classes full and a solid community that made me realise I could do that full time, for some can be less, for some can be longer, but you gotta be smart with the decisions.
Most probably if I knew what I know today about social media I could have speed up the process, most of my students came from word of mouth at the time, but using instagram effectively could have helped me grow that community faster for sure, however I’m very happy with the fact it wasn’t so fast because it gave me time to develop as a teacher and as a dancer.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

Dancing has always been a passion. In my hometown there were no dance studios and dancing was definitely not sen as something that can be a career. I entered my first dance groups after I finished college, I was working full time as an English teacher and going to rehearsals, trainings and competitions in the spare time. This lasted only a year as I moved out of my country, Brasil, to peruse some experience abroad in Dublin, Ireland,
In my first year living there I made friends who were dancers, got a gig in a club called the George where I’d dance couple of times a month and started renting spaces and brining my co workers from the restaurant to dance with me. An opportunity came for me to teach Dancehall, a style I had some knowledge and no one else in the country was teaching.
From this opportunity my professional career really started, it was September 4th 2018, my first official lesson in a studio. During my time in Ireland I competed another degree and a masters degree, also worked as a waitress and restaurant manager for about 5 years.
From there I started teaching also afro dance styles and choreography. I organised the country’s first and only dancehall events, I also created a crew which had over ten people from different countries.
All my classes were full of immigrants, people looking for fun but also to belong somewhere. I’d have over ten nationalities inside my classes.
In December 2020 I moved to turkey, where I also got to build a strong afro and dancehall community, and again, people from all over the world,
In 2022 I started studying twerk style and today it is one of ,y biggest requests for workshops.
My main characteristics are my good energy and cultural care when I teach, I give information about the styles which help people appreciate where it comes from and give the due respect to them. As all my dance styles are from black culture background I make sure my students understand that and give importance to it. I think these are things that make me stand out in the industry and also helped me shape my online following, having regular courses online, digits, products and a following of almost 500k on my social media channels.
My students are mostly women but even with men I’ve got feedback of how I made them feel part of a community while living abroad, how they feel connected and increase their self stem in my classes. Making people feel good and see progress in their dance, while learning about the culture is 100% part of what ,made me successful and able to travel and teach in different countries.
To this date I’ve taught in Ireland, Brazil, Türkiye, austria, UK, Switzerland, Romania, spain and will soon add Germany and Bahrain to the list.

Is there a particular goal or mission driving your creative journey?

My mission is to help make the world a better place. I know it sounds so unrealistic but Kimmie break it down. I believe that happy people make an impact. I believe that with all our differences we are actually,y stronger together and brining people from different backgrounds to a space where I can make them move their bodies, learn new cultures and connect to each other helps creating the type of energy this world needs for healing. Dancing is powerful and the types of dance I focus on are all community based. It is not about competing, all of them are born on the streets, as a factor of strength of minorities. That’s why it is so healing and empowering to dance these styles, and that’s why I believe the more we can create these spaces the more we help decrease racism, xenophobia and any type of prejudice. Apart from it, people learning how to ,for and be comfortable with their bodies elevates them and their energy and their vibration, happier people happier society, one booty at a time. I cannot change the world by myself but sure I can be part of the change.

For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?

The people I get to meet and the lives I get to change. I’ve had students that became my best friends, students that became teachers because of me. I have people I know everywhere in the world and this is incredible. I have contact with differ t nationalities every single day, and for me is now so normal to live in different environments with different opinions. It is a blessing to be able to connect with so many amazing humans

Contact Info:

• Instagram: @lucilleaires @kwetu.movement