The Clean and the Dirty

In reality, life is not clean. Acknowledging this fact is the best way of making it less dirty, and of making ourselves happier in turn. – Ana Cristina Leonardo

Change our inner selves
The transition towards a sustainable society has been central to Vera Mantero’s work for some years now. In The Clean and the Dirty, the Portuguese choreographer focuses on the inner transition. If we want to change our relationship with our environment and with the way we care for it, then we also need to change our inner selves. This means caring for that precarious ‘self’.

Mantero sees a connection between these inner transition processes and what happens when art is being created. “Dealing with the materials of which the world is comprised! That is one of the ways of describing what we do in art. Dealing with objects, images, words, movements, intensities, space, time, longings, vibrations and ghosts both makes us dirty and cleanses us.”

• Vera Mantero is the grande dame of Portuguese contemporary dance. She has previously appeared at Kaaitheater with kɘ supˈɔɾtɐ i sɘpˈaɾɐ i kõtˈɐj uʃ dˈojʃ mˈuduʃ i õdˈulɐ (2005) and Until the moment when God is destroyed by the extreme exercise of beauty (2007).