Inspired by the spirit of freedom in Berlin in the 1920s, the women's movement offered an opportunity to go out, attended theater performances, concerts, exhibitions and decide on the model of the "new woman", imitating Grete Stern and Ellen Auerbach who wore pants and short hair.

Using a Leica film camera, she photographed portraits, landscapes and scenes of everyday life.

They experimented with new techniques, unusual camera angles, picture cutouts, exposures and photomontages.

"Mandello" did work for Fémina, Harper’s Bazaar and Vogue, as well as the fashion houses of Balenciaga, Guerlain, Maggy Rouff, and Creed.

After the outbreak of World War II, Mandello and her husband were considered Alien Enemies within the French Republic and were forced to leave Paris in early 1940.

With visas to Uruguay, Mandello and Grunebaum left France and started a new life in South America where she exhibited beginning in 1943.

In 1952, she exhibited at Museum of Modern Art, Rio de Janeiro, and two years later, she separated from her husband, and moved to Brazil to be with the journalist, Lothar Bauer.