Raquel Figueiredo

After arriving from Sao Vicente in 1989, Raquel Figueiredo formed Waterbury's young dance group Warm Heart, teaching them funana and tchabeta and making new dance outfits. She always loved the colorful celebration of Carnival in Cape Verde, so she started a program at the Cape Verdean Social Club in February 1998 to showcase Carnival costumes and dances. Raquel admired the nature of Cape Verdean culture in Santiago, where island traditions are "homegrown" and less influenced by other cultures. She has been strongly committed to teaching Cape Verdean-American children about their heritage. Raquel also writes poetry and drama focusing on the mid-1980s, a troubled time of intense emigration to America, and she makes traditional Cape Verdean dolls dressed in island costumes. Her dolls were exhibited in CCHAP’s Hidden Treasures exhibit at the Office of the Arts Gallery in Hartford in 2001. Raquel participated in the urban Artists Initiative run by the Institute for Community Research and the Connecticut Office of the Arts in 1998-2003. Her dance group Warm Heart performed at several Waterbury festivals, at Cape Verdean events, and participated in the Southern New England Traditional Arts Apprenticeship program from 1999-2001 to work with musicians Joao Cerilo and Eurico Semedo.