Like alkantara's earlier projects, Encounters focused on international collaboration and intercultural dialogue, except this time, on a much larger scale. Between August 2005 and June 2006, alkantara (Lisbon) and Panorama Rio Dança (Rio de Janeiro) organised a yearlong project in which artists from different cultural contexts worked together in addressing themes of cultural difference, the notions of cultural 'translation' and 'negotiation' and the creation and presentation of art in different cultural contexts.

A series of residencies involving a group of artists from Portugal, Spain, Brazil, Austria, Czech Republic, Germany, Egypt, Serbia and Japan. During the project, artists confront their individual experiences and cultural identities in a series of meetings and residencies held over a one-year period. Encounters also researched the nomadic nature of contemporary creation through a renewed look at site specific creation and presentation. The results of the 6 partnerships - a serie of collaborative performances - were presented as part of the Alkantara festival in June 2006.

Encounters was supported through ECF grants and concluded with the public seminar 'Before and After the Show' which was developed and supported in the context of ALMOSTREAL.