Vera Mantero was born in Lisbon in 1966. She studied classical dance until she was eighteen. She worked for five years in the Ballet Gulbenkian, in Lisbon. In New York and Paris she studied contemporary dance technique, voice and theatre, and by then she completely cut with her ballet origins. As a dancer she also worked in France with Catherine Diverrès. She started creating her own choreography in 1987 and since 1991 she has been showing her work in theatres and festivals in Europe, Brazil, USA, Canada and Singapore.

In 1999 the Theatre Culturgest in Lisbon organized a retrospective of her work.
She regularly participates in international improvisation projects and teaches workshops of creation/composition and improvisation.

Since the year 2000 Vera Mantero is dedicating herself more and more to the voice. The concert “Vera Mantero and Pedro Pinto play Caetano Veloso” has already been toured in many European cities. With Nuno Vieira de Almeida she worked on the concert “Vera Mantero sings the Americans … with Nuno Vieira de Almeida” (songs by Cole Porter, George Gershwin, Kurt Weill and others) that was already shown on various occasions in Lisbon, Viseu, Porto and Figueira da Foz. She also participates in two experimental music/spoken word projects: “Separados Frutos” with Nuno Rebelo, Ulrich Mitzlaff and Manuel Guimarães and more recently “So happy together” with Vítor Rua and Nuno Rebelo. She represented Portugal at the 26th Bienal of São Paulo 2004 together with the sculptor Rui Chafes with the co-creation “Eating the heart out”.
In 2002 Vera Mantero was awarded the Almada Prize (IPAE/Ministry of Culture) for her career as a performer and choreographer.