In 2023, Viva was awarded an Artist Residency at SPACE538. This award will support the production of VIVA’s debut original release, Hot GLAMN!
In 2021, Viva became an Indigo Arts Alliance Artist-In-Residence, studying guitar under world-renowned bluesman Samuel James. During her residency she developed material for a solo show that combines activism with joyful dance.
In 2023, Viva won a project grant from the National Endowment for the Arts American Rescue Plan via SPACE538. This grant has resulted in the composition of Hot GLAMN! which will be VIVA’s debut original release.
In 2021 VIVA was a Maine Arts Commission grantee, which resulted in her rebirth as an independent artist. The new singles, Goddess of Love, Want Me, and My Pearl, along with the steamy multimedia pieces created in collaboration with Violette Media, coming to stages around the US and the UK in 2024 and ‘25
As a child, Viva was exposed to a robust variety of music from Cuban salsa to 90s pop to chamber orchestra and the great American songbook. She made her stage debut with musical theatre in high school. She began singing with a small jazz combo at 21 years old and directed her first performance a year later. After time recording in studio and abroad, Viva assembled an elite team of jazz musicians for the premiere of her band VIVA & The Reinforcements. Since then, the group has played hundreds of events in dozens of cities across the continents.
Viva is the granddaughter of economist Alfred P Thorne, author of Poor By Design, a book that examines systemic exploitation of former colonial states, and the great-granddaughter of A A Thorne, a human rights advocate and the first person of African descent in the world to earn both bachelor's and advanced graduate degrees conferred by a British University. This legacy informs Viva’s values of education access, civic participation, and intersectional feminism.
VIVA
Actor & Model
VIVA has appeared in several short films, commercials, and modeling campaigns
In October 2023, VIVA starred in Reverse The Curse, written and directed by Erin Enberg, which premiered in the Damnationland anthology.
This film marks VIVA’s fourth Damnationland appearance, and her second collaboration with Erin Enberg, following the success of their 2020 short film Sad Bat.
In March 2023 VIVA modeled for the contemporary revolutionary artist Dread Scott, appearing in Goddam, a solo show that features works on canvas inspired by songs sung by Nina Simone. Its exhibition has been extended at the Cristin Tierney Gallery.
FOUNDING A LEGACY
In 2019, she performed for the Inaugural Celebration of Maine’s 75th (and first female) Governor, Janet Mills. That year she also provided the entertainment for the 35th Annual EQME Gala, Coffee By Design’s 25th Anniversary, Maine Initiatives’ 25th Anniversary, New Ventures’ 40th Anniversary, United Way of Greater Portland’s 90th Anniversary, and that same summer, VIVA & The Reinforcements headlined Pride! Portland on the main stage. VIVA & The Reinforcements also played the weddings of Sonya Cisneros & John Wierzoweicki and Olivia Boucher & Robin Westcott.