After a performance in Amman, Jordan, which Princess Muna had attended, I approached her to greet her, in full accordance with protocol. However, I became nervous and forgot part of her royal title. With a smile, she finished the sentence for me. The best parts were the conversation I had with her and the award she presented to me personally.

I was born and raised in Pravia, in the beautiful region of Asturias. Later, our family moved to Barcelona, but to this day I still love returning to my hometown. As a child, I had two big dreams: I wanted to speak every language in the world and become an actor. Back then, I could never have imagined that one day I would be able to combine both of those dreams through the art of mime.

Many writers often compare their books to their own children. For a long time, I felt the same way about my mime pieces. Each one had a special place in my heart, because I had created them artistically. But that changed when I became a father. Since then, I’ve known that nothing in the world compares to a child.

I never learned how to handle marionettes. Still, I was able to perform with one on stage and was even invited to perform at a marionette festival. When a fan gave me a marionette that looked just like me, I was deeply moved. Then I thought: The advantage of marionettes is that they don’t need a physical therapist.

You could say that the theatre “Kabarett der Galgenstricke” has become my second home. I’ve been performing there on and off since 2004. Over the years, I’ve developed not only a close working relationship but also a wonderful friendship with the theater’s management. Erich Koslowski even went on to direct my show “Fata Morgana.” As things stand today (June 2026), I plan to give my final performance in full makeup there in December 2027. It’s an enchanting place to hang up my mime mask.

At conventions like this one here in Argentina, I never present a full program on the main stage; instead, I perform just one or two pieces that fit the event’s theme. The reason for this is that, with such a large audience, the performance has to be broadcast on big screens. Furthermore, each number would require about an hour of rehearsal time with the camera crew and the director. In the hectic pace of a mega-conference like this, there’s usually no time for that.

This curious photo, which shows both sides of me—with makeup and without—was taken during a video shoot at the Theaterhaus Stuttgart.

I traveled to South Africa to teach courses on nonverbal communication. Later, during a photo safari, I realized that the animals’ body language was a complete mystery to me. When we arrived at the hotel, I asked the tour guide if it was true that we had been in danger while near the elephants. “Yes, do you also know the body language of elephants?” he asked me. “No, but I was paying attention to yours.”

On June 13, 2010, I performed at the Bern soccer stadium in front of by far the largest audience of my entire career. Of course, the tens of thousands of people hadn’t come for me, but for “Christus Day.” Nevertheless, it was an unforgettable experience against such an impressive backdrop. To ensure that everyone could follow my performance, it was broadcast on giant screens—as is common at other major events. That way, even in a massive stadium, the mime artist’s most subtle gestures were visible to everyone.

In this photo, I’m waiting my turn, dressed as a thief. For the music project “Pictures at an Exhibition,” Linard Bardill created a new story based on Mussorgsky’s famous work: the pictures in the exhibition were to be stolen by a thief who, in the process, becomes entangled in all sorts of adventures with the children on stage. The work was performed in 2008 in collaboration with the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich, conducted by Vladimir Ashkenazy. A few years later, I had the opportunity to play this thief again when the Musikkollegium Winterthur revived the project.

Some people believe it’s enough to just put on white gloves, but a mime doesn’t need them. I’ve chosen to wear them because they illustrate how important it is to preserve this art form like an antique dealer, to create objects with the precision of a lab technician, and to present them to the audience with the sensitivity of a butler. The best part is that I can take them off at the end to reveal the true protagonists: the hands.

When a journalist holds a microphone right under a mime’s nose, the temptation to speak is very strong. Andreas Malessa and I toured Germany and Switzerland together in 2005 and 2008 with the show “Still und Stark.” During the performances, the words entered into a dialogue with the mime, the voice, and the silence, and it was precisely these contrasts that created many funny and surprising moments on stage.

Anyone who has ever attended one of my workshops may be familiar with this story. A young, blonde German woman attended my workshop several years in a row. At some point, I asked her why she took the same course so often. She replied, “I love watching your students. They’re like children touching snow for the first time.” I now see this striking image reflected in all my classes and in her work. Nicole Wendel is a visual artist and instructor. Whenever we see each other, she tells me that it all began in those mime classes.

In 2020, the coronavirus pandemic brought public life—and with it, the cultural sector—to a standstill. Events had to be canceled, travel was virtually impossible, and a strict lockdown was imposed in Spain.
As performances gradually became possible again, masks and social distancing remained part of everyday life. Instead of a handshake, there was a cautious elbow bump, as can be seen here between Christoph Zehendner and me. In this case, however, it was not just a greeting, but a warm hug as a thank-you for his tremendous generosity toward artists during the pandemic.

When people think of Brazil, they automatically picture sunshine, beaches, and the ocean. But it can get cold there, too. For example, there was no heat in the theater’s dressing room, so I had to make do with this blanket.

The music festival in Boswil (CH) came up with the idea of inviting the virtuoso pianist Shani Diluka and me. Upon our arrival, we were asked to put together a 45-minute program to be performed that very same evening: a dialogue between classical music and pantomime. We had only four hours to prepare. That made the result all the more astonishing. One audience member said, “You’ve united two worlds to create a new universe.” Another asked, “How long have you been working together?” I held up four fingers to indicate the number of hours, but he thought I meant four years. And there was no way to convince him otherwise! That’s how “Klassisch!” came to be. My agent described it this way: “Two independent artists who, together on stage, reach a dimension that was previously unthinkable.” Shani herself sums it up: “There’s so much poetry and raw emotion in it that every generation can relate to our dialogue. Poetry isn’t a bestseller, but everyone needs it.”

For once, I took the stage at the Instituto Cervantes in Budapest and used words instead of silence. My book Ungeschminkte Weisheiten had just been published in Spanish, and I had the privilege of presenting it there.

In China, everything is done on a grand scale. ;-) By the way, it was a program on the topic of “water” that took me to China for the first time in 2016. Later, I discovered a surprising connection: World Water Day coincides with World Mime Day (March 22).

Even we mimes have a voice. This photo was taken at the studios of Radio Nacional de España (RNE) when I gave an interview to mark World Mime Day.

In Pristina, Kosovo, I not only performed on various stages, including the National Theater, but also appeared in front of various television cameras. Naturally, the journalists were expecting not only my words but also some typical pantomime gestures.

In 1986, I was invited by JFC to an international gathering in Kulmbach, Germany, where I was scheduled to perform. That’s where I met Darlene from Canada. Back then, my English skills were limited to “Speak slowly, please” (“Sprich langsam bitte!”), but that didn’t stop us from understanding each other and having fun with the misunderstandings.

Until the mid-1990s, we went on various tours through Germany—she performing her songs on the piano and I presenting my silent art—before she returned to Canada.

In 2006, during my honeymoon in Canada, Darlene invited me to perform. With my wife’s express consent, I gladly accepted the invitation.

In the summer of 2004, the enthusiastic theater audience in Almada (Portugal) selected my show “Hand Made” from among thirty European theater productions and awarded me the Audience Award at the Almada Theater Festival. A journalist, who couldn’t believe that a mime artist had won the festival, personally recounted the votes. He then published an article confirming this fact.

There are many things I admire about Switzerland—especially the chocolate. Luckily,unbegrenzte Mengen Pralinen my job as a mime allows me to enjoy it without gaining weight.

At this beginner’s workshop in the Czech Republic, I not only had an unusually large number of participants, but also a special guest: a person in a wheelchair. People in wheelchairs can also perform mime, with the focus on the use and expression of the hands (mime objects) and the face (emotions).

In 2017, I was bestowed a very special honor. At the first World Congress of Mime in Serbia, the presidents of the WMO (World Mime Organization), Marco Stojanović and Ofer Blum, presented me with the WMO Award for my contributions to the art of mime. At the same time, I was named a lifetime member of this organization.

I got my very first business card in 1994. It was exceptionally colorful and combined the yellow and red of the Spanish flag with the green of hope. Later, I opted for black, white, and red, and then for black, white, and gold. After all, “Silence is golden.”

In 1995, I ventured into an experiment that was a far cry from classical mime. Together with Amalia F. Romero from Madrid, I staged a performance using liquid clay and explored all its possibilities. Little by little, the clay dried under the intense Spanish sun until we eventually became living statues.

... and some are more equal than others

Although I had already been on tour with my solo mime shows, I never gave up my love for the theater. Between 1997 and 2000, I toured Sweden, England, and Spain with Teatro Zahorí and the play “The Golden Rule / Learning by Doing.” The project was a celebration of the preservation and respect for diversity in an open Europe and was supported by the European Union’s Socrates Foundation.

In October 2002, I was honored by the Ecumenical Foundation “Bible and Culture” at the Renitenztheater in Stuttgart for my portrayal of biblical themes. This photo was taken during the award ceremony with the president of the German Bible Society, Prof. em. Dr. Hans Maier.

One of the outcomes of my mime classes was the Christmas show “Silent Night,” which I had conceived for the performance with some of my students. It was a performance that was as unconventional as it was entertaining, exploring the meaning and nonsense of Christmas. The show ran from 2001 to 2004. In the photo, you can see Susan Espejo to my left and Andrew Vanoni to my right.

During one of my tours, I performed at a military base in Latvia. Since there was no stage, the sergeant asked some soldiers to solve this problem. They improvised a stage out of stacked ammunition crates. Fortunately, we all came out of it unscathed.

I performed at a rock festival in front of 600 people who were eagerly awaiting their favorite band's set. At first, it seemed as though there was no place for my silence there. So I was all the more surprised when, at the end, they asked me for an encore.

When I was starting out in my career, I dreamed of performing one day at the Dimitri Theatre in Switzerland. However, my manager advised me to be patient. That dream came true in the early 2000s: Dimitri attended my show Human Rights in Zurich and subsequently invited me to perform at his legendary theatre. What started as a single performance turned into fourteen, plus a masterclass at his renowned Scuola Dimitri. Even more valuable, however, was the friendship that developed. He always greeted me as "friend and colleague". Later, Dimitri wrote about my work: 'What I admire most is that there are no human situations he cannot portray - with humour.' His words still mean a great deal to me today.

In 2006, I was invited to perform my program “Human Rights” in Russia. Human Rights are a universal principle that affects us all, regardless of borders. I was therefore very grateful to have the opportunity to present my work on such an international stage and to be able to make my small contribution to this global and important message through the humble medium of mime.

Some shows stay with us for many years, while others, precisely because of their brevity, become unforgettable. PianOmime was founded in 2001 by the pianist and composer Johannes Nitsch. Using his incredible musical talent, he brought several of my mime pieces to life, including ‘The Window’, ‘The Love Letter’ and ‘Dinner for Two’.

However, Johannes stood out not only for his compositional mastery, but also for his brilliant performing skills. He enriched the rest of my pieces by improvising melodies every night. In our nearly forty shared performances, the stage was filled with precision, rhythm, humour, and unexpected twists.

Sadly, our collaboration came to an end far too soon. In September 2002, he passed away unexpectedly due to a post-operative complication. Since then, PianOmime has remained in my memory as a unique and valuable chapter in my performing career.

Jürgen Werth and I worked as solo performers for decades. In 2019, we took to the stage together for the first time. Although mime and instrumental music blend perfectly, performing with sung lyrics proved to be a complex challenge. Jürgen’s lyrics were so descriptive that my body language risked becoming either redundant or distracting. This is because a mime's gestures often create words in people's imaginations — "When I saw your gestures," one audience member told me, "I thought you were speaking to me in my own dialect" — while Jürgen's songs create images in the audience's minds.

However, after six months of intense rehearsals, we managed to create a dialogue between the songs and gestures where both art forms complemented each other rather than competed. The project was so well received by the audience that two years later, after the pandemic, we went on tour together again.

At the 2006 Amnesty International Human Rights Award ceremony in Berlin, the focus was certainly on the commitment to human rights, but it was also a wonderful gathering of numerous artists. One of them was Herbert Grönemeyer, with whom this photo was taken—after my performance. He is holding my DVD “Human Rights” in his hands—a lovely memento of an evening when art and humanity came together.

As an actor, I am a member of the Catalan Actors' Association. Although mimes are rather rare, I have always felt at home there. To celebrate my 25th anniversary on stage in 2007, my photo appeared on the cover of the magazine. Inside, there was an article recognising the international significance of my art with the following title: 'Prophet Abroad'.

For years I had the privilege of performing with Clemens Bittlinger and his musicians. This collaboration resulted in many shows, the last of which was "Aufgeräumt" (Order). Through music, mime, and humor, we brought order to the room and to the souls of the audience. Unlike market norms, where music usually overshadows the art of mime, Clemens showed tremendous generosity by incorporating my "small art" into his large-scale concerts in front of thousands of people. To this day, I smile when I think back to the day when the sound system failed in front of 5,000 spectators and he said to me: "You don't need a microphone. Can you do something?" He was a generous friend and a great patron of my art within the German church community. My gratitude toward him remains undiminished.

While in Poland, I had the pleasure of working with two very special performers: Jonathan and Agnieszka Cianciara Fröhlich from the theatre studio, Studio Dono. They organised several performances and workshops for me with great dedication.

Later they wrote the following lines for the programme for 'Time to Celebrate':
'It is very difficult to encounter a true master. Our world is full of new stars who suddenly appear and shine brightly for a few moments before being pushed aside again by the fickle television audience. But when you encounter a true master, you know it. That’s how it was for us when we met Carlos. It's not just the artistry, but the wisdom that comes with time and experience, too — his essence as an artist and a human being: generous, brilliant, surprising and delightful.'

Their words touched me as much as the bouquet of flowers and the kisses they gave me.

A radiant encounter in cloudy Barcelona. This photo was taken in 2023.
It was a great pleasure to talk about mime with Víctor, a master of this art.
I first met Víctor in Argentina in 2014 when he took part in a workshop that I was leading in Buenos Aires. That brief encounter blossomed into a beautiful friendship.
Víctor's immense generosity meant that he not only opened the doors of his home to me, but also the doors to the world of Argentinian mime, introducing me to some of the country's greatest artists. I learned that Argentinian mimes speak... and a lot! This confirms that behind the silence lies a world full of words.
Honesty, respect and good humour always prevail in my long conversations with Víctor. After all, aren't these the qualities we should carry with us, even when wearing a mask?

Allow me to introduce you to my oldest student, who is still active today: Ludwig Zink from Switzerland.
He has attended numerous performances and workshops of mine since 2003. He has travelled to Barcelona several times to take private lessons. I’ve had the privilege of guiding him through the creation and development of his own pantomime pieces. Most recently, in 2023, we collaborated to create three new short pieces that he added to his repertoire. Maintaining physical mobility and facial expressiveness continuously can become a wonderful form of self-care over the years. Ludwig is undoubtedly a role model for us all as we grow older.

In 2016, I attended an international conference for deaf people in Seville. Sign language interpreters were indispensable during the presentations. It was striking that one interpreter per language wasn’t enough; for example, there was one interpreter for Austrian German and another for German German, as well as one for American Sign Language and another for British Sign Language. The same was true of the other languages represented, as every country has its own unique sign language characteristics. However, when it was my turn to perform, no interpreter was needed. The stories were understood immediately. This experience confirmed to me once again the universal nature of mime.

In 2019, I had the honour of taking part in the 'Gasparáda' International Festival of Mime and Theatre in Kolín, Czech Republic. The festival honours the city’s most famous son, Jean-Gaspard Deburau, widely regarded as one of the pioneers of classical mime. Although no recordings of his performances exist, his character lives on to this day thanks to Jean-Louis Barrault’s unforgettable portrayal in the film Les Enfants du Paradis. Performing at a festival dedicated to Jean-Gaspard Deburau was a true privilege.

Throughout my theatre career, I have repeatedly received offers from film production companies and advertising agencies. My manager, Joyce Phillips, reviewed each one very carefully. Only a few met her high standards.
One of these was a poetic short film by Swiss filmmaker Xaver Walser, featuring the voice of actress Uma Thurman.
I would like to express my sincere thanks to Xaver Walser for allowing me to share this video with you on my YouTube-Channel.