VERA MANTERO studied classical dance and worked in Ballet Gulbenkian in Lisbon between 1984 and 1989. She started creating her own choreography in 1987 and since 1991 she has been showing her solo and group work all over Europe, Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Singapore, South Korea and USA.

From her choreographic work she points out her solos “Perhaps she could dance first and think afterwards” (1991), “Olympia” (1993), “one mysterious Thing, said e.e.cummings*” (1996), “What can be said about Pierre” (2011), as also her group pieces “Under” (1993), “For Boring and Profound Sadnesses” (1994), “Poetry and Savagery” (1998), “Until the moment when God is destroyed by the extreme exercise of beauty” (2006), “We are going to miss everything we don’t need” (2009) and more recently “The Caldeirão highlanders, exercises in fictional anthropology” (2012) and “Maximum Wage” (2014).

In 2013 and 2014 she created the performance installations “Shadows being offered” and “More for Less than for More”, the latter one in partnership with Culturgest and Maria Matos Teatro Municipal.

Vera Mantero participates regularly in international improvisation projects alongside improvisers and choreographers as Lisa Nelson, Mark Tompkins, Meg Stuart and Steve Paxton. Since the year 2000 Vera Mantero is dedicating herself also to vocal work by singing the repertoire by several authors and co-creating experimental music projects.

In 1999 the Culturgest in Lisbon organized during one month a retrospective of her work created until then, which was entitled “Month of March, Month of Vera”.

“Eating your heart out”, a work created in collaboration with the sculptor Rui Chafes, represented Portugal at the 26th Biennial of São Paulo 2004.

In 2002 Vera Mantero was awarded the Almada Prize (IPAE/Ministry of Culture) and in 2009 the prestigious Gulbenkian Art Prize for her career as a performer and choreographer.