Matter for Future Excavation

Matter for Future Excavation is an exhibition that looks at the city and interrogates it, as a gesture of excavating the matter of which it is made, in order to reveal its different overlapping strata, the less visible configurations of its tracing and thus unravel the tensions that run through it.

Matter: We start from the tangible matter of the city, the territory in which it is located, the architectures that configure it, the rhythms that compose it, the relationships that weave it and the daily practices and gestures that shape it.

Excavating: Memory «is the medium of that which is experienced, just as the earth is the medium in which ancient cities lie buried», wrote Walter Benjamin. In the act of excavating the whole body is invested, a good plan is not enough, one needs to know how to excavate the layers not immediately visible.

Future: If the excavation exposes eroded traces to our present, it reveals the underlying tensions made invisible by the images of the city in this neoliberal era. And this revelation opens up possibilities for the future which, grounded in the recognition of these hidden matters, liberate social and political powers and enable imaginaries of change.

Matter for Future Excavation proposes a journey through six installation works comprising photography, video and sound. The works stemmed from an artists’ residency process where, while roaming Lisbon’s east side, we experienced walking as a form of situated research, and discussed three conceptual images, the «villa-façade», « city-image» and «threshold», that guided this joint excavation.

Curators: Ana Jara and Joana Braga

Cidades subtis, video installation by Carlos Gomes
Fonografia do cuidado, sound installation by Fernando Ramalho
Sem prata, photography by Luísa Ferreira
Habitantes, video installation by Tânia Moreira David and Fernando Ramalho
Found Movement, video installation by Tânia Moreira David
Inscrição, photography by Valter Vinagre

For more information, check the exhibition leaflet.

Talk with the artists

To round off the visit to the exhibition, a talk in the Palace Courtyard with its curators and artists. The motto is how the showcase questions and reshapes the city geographies and their temporality, through photography, moving image, sound and words. A debate and reflection upon the different views of the city, the images produced and the spatialities reinvented in the art works, questioning the issues that focus on the authors’ positioning in relation to the object of their art: How can artistic practices, in their making the world, contribute to thinking and questioning the cities in which we live and the way we relate to them? How can the corporeal perception of spaces and places question and expand the readings we make of the city? To what extent do the views in this exhibition question the city that is now being produced, and how can they open up new possibilities for the future?

Thursday, May 20, 2021, 6:30 pm 

Guided tours and Activities

We have two educational printed activity sheets available for 6 to 12-year-old children and 12 to 18-year-old teens, to be done with the family during the visit to the exhibition.

Bird Flight Workshop
When a bird flies, it looks at the roofs of houses, terraces, land, and paths from the sky, looking down on the city from the heights. This way of observing allows us to question images, drawings, boundaries and borders, uses and occupation forms of urban space.

Saturday, May 8, 10:30 am and 11:00 am
Concept and Mediation: Letícia do Carmo, Educational Service
Ages: 6-12 years old
Duration: 90 minutes
Capacity: 10 people maximum (children and adults)
Price: €5/child
Booking: actividades@trienaldelisboa.com

Guided Tours & Workshops for Schools
Bird Flight, primary education (1st to 6th grade)
Fifth-façade, secondary education (7th to 12th grade)
Tuesday to Friday, mornings
Duration: 90 minutes
Price: €1/student
Booking: actividades@trienaldelisboa.com

Guided Tours for Schools and Groups
Tuesday to Saturday, exhibition’s opening hours
Mediation: Educational Service
Duration: 60 minutes
Capacity: A class or groups of 7 people maximum 
Price: €5 / person (weekdays), €7 / person (Saturdays)
Booking: actividades@trienaldelisboa.com

NB: The activity will take place only if the maximum number of participants is attained.