João Oliveira & Mariana Pontes Barbosa, originally from the North, are performers and creators who seek to question and challenge the power dynamics within the contexts in which they operate, valuing multidisciplinarity and diversity as central pillars of their artistic practices.
João Oliveira is a performer and creator based in Lisbon. He has collaborated with various directors and choreographers, including Carlos Costa, Né Barros, Sofia Dias & Vítor Roriz, Filipe Moreira, Ricardo Pais, Madalena Vitorino, Bernardo Gavina, Francisco Camacho, and Rogério Nuno Costa, among others. As a creator, he is interested in blending various art forms, particularly theater and dance, and in the past year, he has ventured into writing dramatic texts. He is the author of the plays Dois Peixes em Marte (2021) with Andreia Fraga; Caem Calhaus do Céu (2022); Dostoyevsky Made Me Do It (2023); and Violeta (2023). In 2023, he was one of the Guest Artists at the DDD – Dias da Dança 2023 Festival.
Mariana Pontes Barbosa, as a creator, is credited with the co-creations “CERES”, with Gisela Ferreira and Délia Krayenbüh, and “SUPER-STARE”, with Rafael Ferreira. She appears in the film “Viaggiare nella maionese”, a collaboration between TheBunch Festival and the Fiumara D’arte Foundation, shot in Sicily. As a professional dancer, she has engaged with the work of artists and companies that have influenced her career, notably André Uerba, Roberto Olivan, Ana Isabel Castro, Daniela Cruz, Davis Freeman, Pedro Ramos, São Castro, Christine Hassid, Sara Garcia and Rogério Nuno Costa, amongst others.