Kecia Felix Donnelly (K Sea Ya) (Kecya) b. 1983
K Sea Ya (Kecia) is a singer-songwriter, multimedia artist, and educator born and raised between the capital of Minas Gerais, the Brazilian Cerrado, and the Atlantic Forest in Rio de Janeiro. Currently, she divides her time between California, Rio de Janeiro, and São Paulo. Her artistic journey is marked by a unique and mystical approach, blending elements of performance art, voice, dance, visual arts, and fashion production, exploring autobiographical themes and rites of passage.
In October 2023, K Sea Ya released her debut single, "Crisálida," which initiated the project for her first album, "Cantos para Transições." Since then, she has released other singles, solidifying her presence in Brazil's independent music scene.
Beyond her musical endeavors, K Sea Ya has developed a body of performative work inspired by her biography, emphasizing personal and social transformations. Her journey is intuitive and self-taught, reflecting a genuine search for an original voice. Her cultural background and experiences in movement-based practices, visual arts, and integrative approaches that combine healing, somatic regeneration, and ecosystem restoration shape this pursuit.
Her artistic path is supported by a strong educational foundation in transformative practices, including certifications through MIT's U-Lab (U School for Transformation). This informed background sustains her commitment to regenerative education and the use of art to create deep connections among individuals, communities, and nature.
Since her first performance series, EIR or ORI (Eight Rites of Initiation), in 2011, K Sea Ya has explored new ways to integrate art and participatory transformative experiences, such as Teatro Liminal, offering audiences unique and transformative engagements.
Throughout her career, K Sea Ya has collaborated with and learned from renowned artists, including Caíto Marcondes, her current producer and arranger; Anna Halprin, a pioneering artist and choreographer in experimental dance; Silvia Nakkach, Grammy-nominated composer and mentor in vocal and regenerative arts; and Rosângela Silvestre, creator of the Afro-Brazilian Silvestre Technique, which influenced K Sea Ya’s work.
With over 15 years of experience integrating art, healing, and education, K Sea Ya continues to inspire through projects that connect beauty, creativity, and social transformation. She reinforces her identity as a Brazilian artist who crosses boundaries to discover a universal and restorative language.
An artist in the Thresholds
I am walking a path where I seek to bring enchantment back to life. I am an artist dancing on the threshold of a New Era, inviting transformation.
My work focuses on recovering and developing new ways of being and existing in the world.
I facilitate connections and create spaces dedicated to healing social and individual fields. The journey is transpersonal, a return home, and a reimagining how we inhabit with a living presence.
Here and now, I invite you to co-create the future, uniting mind, heart, and hands to act in the present with a recognition of the past while embodying new possibilities for all beings.
Education
In 2022, she will be certified at U School for Transformation at MIT (Massachusetts School of Technology), a 16-week certification course and project application on Awareness-based Systems Change and leadership transformation at the U LAB 1x.
In 2016 she received a certification in Sound, Voice, and Music Healing from CIIS, The California Institute of Integral Studies.
In 2017 she integrated Anna Halprin Performance Lab, from where she received direct teaching and practices of scoring movement. Anna Halprin is a centenary artist pioneer of the experimental dance movement and Score and Ritual Movement.
Between 2008 and 2011, she participated in open courses and exhibitions at the Parque Lage School of Visual Arts in Rio, where she was also influenced by the contemporary scene.
She has a Bachelor's Degree in Fashion Costume and Design from Zuzu Angel Institute of the Veiga de Almeida University, Rio de Janeiro - from where she began questioning fashion in the industrial age as a symbol of cultural objectification of the body and costumes. Still, as a Fashion Costume student, she begins her journey with performance art and experiments in the series Stone Woman (Mulher Pedra), examining the deconstruction of symbol and identity in an encounter with sensory-kinesthetic body and somatic memory.
Arts
Certification in Sound, Voice and Healing Arts (CIIS, San Francisco 2015 - 2016)
Mentorship and Project Planning, with Ricardo Becker (EAV School of Visual Arts Parque Lage, Rio de Janeiro 2009 - 2011)
History of Art from Classic to Contemporary Thinking, with Franz Manata (EAV School of Visual Arts Parque Lage, Rio de Janeiro 2009 - 2011)
Bachelor's degree in Fashion Design (Veiga de Almeida University, Rio de Janeiro, 2008)
Criative Process & Procedencia e Propriedade, with Charles Watson (Instituto Tomie Ohtake, São Paulo, 2011)
Meditation and Mindfulness
Goenka Vipassana Meditation 10 day silent course
Satipatthana Sutta course (Brazil, CA, 2007, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018)
Dance and Movement
Anna Halprin Lab Score at Mountain Home Studio ( Kentfield, CA, 2017 - 2020)
Performance Score Lab (Zoom 2020- Present)
Silvestre Technique and Brazilian Folk Orixá Dance, Theory and Methodology intensive summer course with Rosangela Silvestre / Vera Passos (Funceb, Salvador, Brazil, 2016, 2017)
Silvestre Dance Technique (2015 - present)
Workshop: Body Mapping and Somatics with final site-specific performance, with Nathalie Fari (Institute O Barco, São Paulo, 2013)
Collaborations
Monica Carvalho: Exhibit Vassourinhas, video Salt Oracles ( Rio de Janeiro 2022)
André Arruda: Librdade Project Exhibit ( RIo de Janeiro 2022)
Silvia Nakkach: Transformances (Rio de Janeiro and San Francisco, 2016 - 2017)
Cristina Cordeiro: Art-to-wear design, production, videos, performances (Rio de Janeiro and San Francisco, 2012 - present)
Denise Milan: Performance intervention The Birth of Venus in the Noosphere (São Paulo, 2013)
Ricardo Becker: Performance and photography series at Espelho Seu & Projeto Cisco (Rio de Janeiro, 2012 - 2013)
Residency Programs
Artspan Journal Building Art Residency (San Francisco, August 2017 - 2018)
Artcura Lab (San Francisco 2015-2019)
Cellula Lab at Safe House Residency (San Francisco, May- July 2018)