“This exhibition is a light. We put a light on top of a stick and stuck that stick into the ground. This light is seen by many people». This is how Pedro Cabrita Reis describes the exhibition “289”, which opened on Saturday, July 14, at Solar das Pontes de Marchil, in Faro.
O Sul Informação he was in conversation with Pedro Cabrita Reis (PCR) and also with Tiago Batista and Fernando Sampaio Amaro, directors of Associação 289, the three main people responsible for this project. It was a conversation between dust, the noise of hammers, with the smell of paint, on Friday, while the artists put the finishing touches on their pieces, half of them made on purpose for the space and having it as their own fabric e feedstock.
How did Pedro Cabrita Reis come up with the idea of organizing this exhibition, which brings together, as he said, «people with longer careers, there are others who are younger and are just starting – not only in terms of age and career history, but also in terms of creativity»?
Tiago Batista, himself with a piece in the exhibition, replies: «Pedro passed through here and fell in love with the place. We didn't miss the opportunity to try to get Pedro to do something here, and he, in a very generous and affectionate way, said “let's go!”. This has everything to do with the very affectionate, really loving relationship that Pedro has with the Algarve and we grasped that tooth and nail».
«This space was given to us by one of the owners, who convinced the other, on a lending basis. Your name is José Carlos Mendes, he is a ceramist from Tavira who gave us the manor house at no cost. We only pay the expenses, water, electricity, and we agreed with him that all the improvements we make to the house are on our own. For six months, it was a handshake, now with a signed contract. Several people had already come to him to propose business. When we showed up, we said: no, we're just artists, we don't want to do business. And he liked that», adds Tiago Batista.
Therefore, explains the artist, the word that best defines this exhibition is “generosity”. «That piece by Fernanda Fragateiro, with the word “generosity” on the wall, also has to do with that, with the concession of space and with the generosity of the artists, and of Pedro in particular».
What did Pedro Cabrita Reis see in space to make you fall in love with him? «From the start, the architecture of the house», answers the artist's question. Sul Informação. “I imagine that this house, at its height of splendor, must have been a very pleasant place to live. I like the idea that it was a farming center in another time. Imagine what it was like to hear crossbow cars drive along this sidewalk, as happened in my family's home in Messines. When the crossbow cars with the "farroba" and the almond entered, it was a shrill noise. When I saw this, at their invitation, I felt at home again».
Making a sweeping gesture with his hand, Pedro adds: «in his abandonment, in the melancholy of a house that is dying with a time that has ended, the experience made by artistic creativity, by artists, by these projects, redeem his soul, rescue it and turn it into a luminous house again. If we could save the object that is this house and save it from oblivion and sadness and turn it into something of joy…you can't turn your back on something like this, I can't!”
The way it started to desenhar this exhibition was also remembered. Because Pedro Cabrita Reis, who, due to his dimension as an artist, more than a curator, is a mentor of the project, did not know many of the artists who are now showing their work, until 15th September, in the old Solar outside Faro. In the house, in its gardens, walls, interior and exterior, rooms and cubicles, on the stairs, on the terraces, on the roof, in the surrounding land and even buried in the ground, there are works by renowned artists, such as Pedro himself, or even Julião Sarmento, Pedro Calapez, Rui Chafes, Xana or Rui Sanches, but also others still starting or with lesser known names.
“All this was a process, several names came up. At times, other artists said to me: do you know the work of so-and-so? I said no, I don't know it well, and images and information were brought to me and I chose. Basically, the construction process of this object is a process of convergence of many tributaries», says PCR.
«Better than anything else, the backbone of how this was built matters: this is not a museum, nor are there curators here, it is the unfolding of a collective effort».
Pedro Cabrita Reis confesses that one of the many things he likes about this exhibition is «the diversity of its authors and work, which never built ditches and ruptures, on the contrary, there is the construction of a common body, made by differences».
«There are many works of different nature, there are painters on canvas, there are photographers, there are people who make direct interventions on the wall, there is Armanda [Duarte] in the background who is building an object that disappears underground. There is a very large, deep and enriching diversity here, not only in terms of work, but also in personal trajectories», he adds.
Tiago Batista stresses, for his part, that “everything that fits within the scope of contemporary art is evident: from performance, to sculpture, to painting, to drawing, to sound installation”.
This exhibition presents «the simple drawing on paper, classic, to a project that Vanda Madureira will make, an action-drawing, a mix of performance and drawing [presented at the opening]. We have sound and silence. There is a telescopic sight looking at the field, we have everything», concludes Pedro Cabrita Reis.
“Languages appear every day, new or transvested in another way, as a result of an evolution or something that is discovered from scratch,” he adds.
Taking advantage of space and force from this secular house, Tiago Batista underlines that "a good dose of the 80 artists participating in this project, perhaps half, have made works specifically for this space."
And Pedro Cabrita Reis immediately recalls: «we made a first exploratory trip, we came from Lisbon by van, some two or three months ago, and the van was full, there were forty and such of us. The Town Hall received us, organized a lunch for us in the old town and we came here to see. People were wandering around, getting to know and intimately already conceiving what they could do, but also the place where they could install their work». It was from this interior dialogue that the works that can now be seen or even heard were born.
And in September, when the exhibition ends (ends on the 15th), will the works remain there? «The interventions made in the house will stay: as long as we manage to keep them, they will stay. Julião Sarmento in there, Paulo Mendes, Fernanda Fragateiro, Bertílio Martins», answers Tiago Batista.
«The skin of a body, in its scars, in its aging, is the story of that body. The 289 association will decide, together with the individual authors, whether things remain or whether they want to paint the wall white», adds PCR.
“Here, the only thing that is truly interesting is the transformation movement, which is permanent, perpetual and does not integrate hierarchies. At one point, there are proposals, others will follow. If you have to paint all of this blue for another show, it will be. And the artists know that», he adds.
The opening of the exhibition, last Saturday at the end of the afternoon, which included many unique moments of performance (from the very beginning, the performance of Pedro Cabrita Reis himself, speaking with a megaphone, from the top of the terrace), was attended by many local and regional officials, such as the mayor of Faro.
Fernando Sampaio Amaro, professor of the Visual Arts course at the University of Algarve, photographer, artist, director of Associação 289, draws attention to the importance of the Municipality's participation in this process: «when the municipality intends to apply for the European Capital of Culture in 2027, it is necessary to nurture this type of projects, to create the creative dynamics».
Pedro Cabrita Reis concludes: “this is going to be important in many aspects. One of them is that it will create a territory for people who are responsible for local administration, in terms of culture, economics, tourism, in all those things that make up the good governance of the regions. These people can perceive that there is material, there is critical mass, there is intelligence, there is availability, and, above all, these people will realize and, why not say, they will learn that, counting on the efforts of the communities that make up the place, in this in the case of this association 289, many things can be imagined and done».
The artist argues that “the best policy is one that is made from the base to the top of the pyramid and not the other way around. It is necessary to gather the initiative and creativity of the base and transform it to become part of the good government of the region».
«But, for that, it is necessary to support, it is necessary to be present, it is necessary to design project implementation strategies. This is a practical experience, on the ground, carried out by an association that does not have millionaire European funds, it lives from the effort and dedication of each one, from the outset intellectual and creative, then technical, practical and financial».
«With a little, even less than a little, with almost nothing, an exhibition was built with 80 artists and who enthusiastically agreed to participate», emphasizes Pedro Cabrita Reis.
«I didn't want to be even more arrogant than what people already know I am, but this exhibition is a lesson for the community, to understand how things can be done!», he guarantees.
However, he stresses, “all things of great quality, small or large, cannot be exclusively based on voluntarism, they have to be integrated into a general policy of administering funds and leveraging things. It's not just: oh, the guys are creative, they do it and everyone goes there to the opening».
PCR is keen to point out that “from this municipality, we have had unequivocal and clear support so far. We know that there is a divorce between the artistic and creative community and the administration, but, in this particular, the City Council of Faro, from the beginning of the project until the end, in September, when the catalog that is being produced is launched, established an understanding with the 289 Association, which has aspects as prosaic as putting 70 people to sleep in Faro in high season, which is not easy, to fundraise to finance the production of the catalogue, order machines from the City Council to clean up the rubble or the land so that we can have parking, arrange the catering».
The exhibition “289”, which will be on display until 15 September, is already the fourth exhibition in the space of Solar das Pontes de Marchil, the place where, for decades, the headquarters of the Associação de Comandos functioned. Tiago Batista announces that «there are already two more shows scheduled, calmer, because this one was very intense, not only for 289, but for the national panorama. Next, on October 15th, we will have Gustavo Jesus. Then, in January, we'll close for rest, because this place is very wild in winter, it's 5 degrees less than in Faro and we are here at 800 meters. And in March we opened with a solo show by Pedro Cabral Santo».
Does the “289” exhibition set a quality standard for future initiatives? “The standard is high and the height of that standard means that people who are looking at this from the outside have to raise their standards of understanding and realize that this isn't half a dozen lunatics, it's a community with certain goals, composed by different people, but who are together to promote these things that are done here. This is not entertainment for young people, it is a house that throws energy into the street and wants to be taken into account and respected as such. This has to be part not of the problems, but of the solutions».
Therefore, PCR argues that “a potential CMF candidacy for the European Capital of Culture has to take into account that this is a reality and that there are others similar in the city, in the municipality and in the region. The interaction of these platforms all together is a strength and this strength has to be taken into account. And the local authorities must look to this force as an ally and not as an unpleasant weight. This is a part of the dialogue!».
In conclusion, Pedro Cabrita Reis insists that this is a “joy project”. «There are words that seem to fall into disuse in a society too massified by consumption. For example, the word “Joy”. It's a very important word, it's not about feelings, it's not about nonsense, it's about an inner state of fullness, of the individual's re-encounter with himself and of re-encounter with others., Joy is this kind of site without measurements and without great physicality. Well, this project is a project of joy. Without having any mystifications of an ideological or religious, esoteric nature. It is the pure and simple joy of sharing energy, of joining efforts, of being together, of doing something that we want to be good».
The exhibition can be seen, until the 15th of September, from Wednesday to Sunday, from 17 pm to 00 pm, at Solar das Pontes de Marchil, on the edge of the EN21, at the exit of Faro to Loule.
Opening of the 289 exhibition in Faro:
Photos: Gonçalo Dourado (from the interview and assembly of the exhibition) and Hugo Rodrigues (of the opening)
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