Tere Mathern is a choreographer, performer, and educator of over 20 years. She formed Tere Mathern Dance in 2002 to create an ongoing setting for her work. Recent works include, Show Me The Body (June 2007) funded by the Regional Arts and Culture Council, and a site- specific work for Keller Fountain, one of the four-part series of dance works for The City Dance of Lawrence and Anna Halprin (September 2008), celebrating Halprin's sequence of Portland open spaces and part of PICA TBA:09.

Known for precision kinetics and lush choreographic patterns, her work is distinct in its marriage of razor-sharp, spare abstraction with fluid, spatial form. Described in Dance Magazine as "lucid, limpid, and smart" Mathern's work leans toward the architectural, combining abstract forms and complex patterns with fluid and forceful athleticism. "I am interested in finding and developing forms and structures that are intimately tied to the conceptual underpinnings if the work -- creating movement which spins outward from an essential idea that drives both its constellation in space and its visceral feel." A reaction to our time and place, Mathern's dances also carry an underlying emotional current where " . . . the balance between sensuality and intellect shifts and shimmers. One moment the choreography focuses on subtly different repetitions . . . the next it cuts loose and wheels through space." (The Oregonian, 1998)

Ms. Mathern has as an M.A. in Interdisciplinary Studies focusing on contemporary dance history and performance studies from NYU and is a Certified Movement Analyst (C.M.A.) in Laban/Bartenieff Movement Studies from the Laban Institute of Movement Studies in NYC. Currently adjunct faculty in dance at PSU, she has taught and/ or performed in various venues throughout the U.S. including the Knitting Factory, and Gowanus Arts Exchange in New York, On the Boards/Seattle, Denison University (OH), The Contemporary Dance Season/PSU, in venues in New Hampshire, Wisconsin and Alaska, and as an assistant to the faculty for Laban/ Bartenieff certification programs at the Laban Institute in NYC and at Mills College, CA.

She has received support from the Oregon Arts Commission, National Endowment for the Arts, and PSU's former Contemporary Dance Season, and the Regional Arts & Culture Council. Past guest artist for Reed Arts Week 2002, a 2003 recipient of a Professional Development Grant from the City of Portland Arts & Economy Initiative, she is a 2009 Oregon Arts Commission Fellowship recipient, received an Oregon Arts Commission Career Opportunity Grant 2010, and is the focus of an OBP Art Beat special broadcast January, 2010
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