Teresa Simas
Teresa Simas is a Portuguese dancer and choreographer.
She made her professional debut as a soloist with Dança Grupo at the Teatro de S. Luís in Lisbon at the age of 16. In 1988 she started her studies at the State Dance School of Kiev in Ukraine, working with professors such as Irina Kriptova, Evgueni Baukin, Vadim Fedotov and Valeria Ivanovna, with whom she studied the Vaganova technique. Teresa also studied Choreography at the University of Dramatic Arts in Moscow . More recently, she worked on the Mézières Method with Elisabeth Gibiat and on the Cunningham technique at the Merce Cunningham Institute in New York.
She worked at the Dietzki Musicalni Ballet with Natalia Satz, in Moscow, where she met choreographer Edvald Smirnov. It was at Smirnov's Russian Chamber Ballet where Simas danced as a soloist from 1992 to 1994, dancing the principal roles in L'Arlesienne and Nero and Seneca, among others. She assisted Smirnov for one year and recreated L'Arlesienne in Cheboksary Theatre.
In 1994, she returned to Portugal, working with CêDêCê and with the Companhia de Dança de Lisboa - where she worked as a rehearsal director and assisted Célia Gouveia, particularly on the creation of "Cabo da Boa Esperança". She also assisted the National Team of Rhythmic Gymnastics as a choreography adviser and Ballet teacher.
From 1996 to 2000 she danced as a soloist with the Gulbenkian Ballet under the direction of Iracity Cardoso, working on her repertoire and many new works with choreographers and ballet masters such as Ohad Naharin, Angelin Preljocaj, Meryl Tankard, Martino Müller, Rui Horta, Jiri Kilian, Olga Roriz, Itzik Galili, Clara Andermat, Rodrigo Pederneiras, Alphonse Poulin, Ivan Kramer, Jorge Garcia, Marie Chouinard, Gilles Jobin and Vladimir Pankov.
Simas moved to London in August 2000, teaching at Bird College and Millennium College as a Cunningham technique teacher. From January 2001 she worked with the Bare Bones Dance Company - working on new creations for a UK tour with choreographers David Massingham, Akram Khan and Henri Oguike.
In January 2002, Simas moved to Aix-en-Provence, where she joined the Ballet Preljocaj, with whom she toured throughout the mainland, Eastern Europe and the USA. She returned to Lisbon in September 2003, where she worked as a soloist with the Gulbenkian Ballet until July 2004.
Simas initiated her choreographic work in Moscow and during 2001 her work was seen at the Purcell Room at the South Bank and Momentum Choreography Festival in London as well as at the Almada International Choreography Platform in Portugal. It was at the very same festival that her new creation - named "Silêncio" - was premiered, in October 2004. A few months before, in August 2004, her choreography "Sappho" was seen in Estonia, at the Kuressaare Kammermuusika Paevad. In February 2005, her new work "Senta-te" was premiered in Lisbon, at the Centro Cultural de Belém, in an evening dedicated to her work.
Her forthcoming projects include a new commission for the Portuguese dance company Dançarte, in April 2006.
Simas speaks Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, English and French. She also enjoys teaching, reading and writing.