João dos Santos Martins

João dos Santos Martins was born in Santarém, Portugal, in 1989. He studied dance and choreography in various institutions across Europe between 2007 and 2011, including P.A.R.T.S. and e.x.er.c.e. He works as a dancer and choreographer since 2008, often articulating his practice among diverse collaborations, expressed in pieces such as Le Sacre du Printemps (2013) with Min Kyoung Lee, Autointitulado, 2015, with Cyriaque Villemaux and Anthroposcenes, 2017, with Rita Natálio. João has also collaborated with Teatro Praga, he adapted the solo Conquest (2011) by Deborah Hay and performed in works of Eszter Salamon and Xavier Le Roy. Earlier this year, he curated the cycle New—Old Dance, reflecting on recent dance history in Portugal in which, along with historian Ana Bigotte Vieira, he put together a Timeline for collectively documenting dance practice in past century. His work has been presented in Portugal, Spain, France, Belgium, Austria, Romania, Republic of Korea, New Zealand, Mozambique, Chile, Brazil and Uruguay. His group piece Continued Project (2015) was recipient of the Portuguese Society of Authors’ Prize for Choreography in 2016.