Our Instructors

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Karima Wilson, aka Professora Venenosa, leads our weekly adult classes. She grew up practicing various dance styles including ballet and African. After moving to Houston in 2003 to become a teacher, she searched for a new hobby and stumbled into a capoeira class, soon falling in love with the mix of dancing and fighting. As a former classroom teacher, Instrutora Venenosa is adept at creating dynamic activities, supporting individual students, and bringing positive energy to the process of learning capoeira. She believes that she learns as much from her students and teaching as they learn from class and is committed to helping each student reach their goals. Outside of capoeira, her other passions are educational equity, cooking and anything by a beach.

Tony Paraná (Instrutor Paraná) was born in Salvador, Bahia in Brazil. He moved to the United States in 2002. Parana’s first contact with capoeira was in 1997 in Brazil, where he trained for a couple of years. In 2007, he restarted training capoeira here in the US again with Contra Mestre Gringo from Capoeira Luanda. Since then, Paraná has been an active capoeirista and has been teaching since 2010. Tony Paraná has performed capoeira around Houston and the US, including the American Folk Festival in Montana, Dance Africa in Denver and here in Houston at Jones Hall. He has also worked with various local organizations, such as Star Of Hope and Young Audience Of Houston teaching capoeira classes in libraries and

schools around the city. Tony leads our children's classes. Outside of capoeira, Tony is an award-winning artist, father, and animal lover.