68 Praga em Lisboa (68: Prague in Lisbon), video 4:3, 13' stereo sound
Galerie Hlavního Města Prahy, Prague (2019 CZ)

Photo March (video projection on found object)

The wall paintings (a re-installation of the work I have developed in 2015 for Kunsthalle Exnergasse), titled V for MFA and V for OF are the first materialization of my research on the forms that recur in both the Carnation and the Velvet Revolutions, namely the hand sign of “V” for victory, which in this case repeats in the graphic arrangements of the acronym MFA for the Portuguese revolutionary Movement of Armed Forces and OF for the Czechoslovak Civic Forum. Two video works and an assemblage one, together with the wall paintings, form a research series on hand signs and political discourse and on the projection of speech, all upon the case study of both revolutions.

68: Praga em Lisboa (68: Prague in Lisbon) is a 13 minute long, 4:3 format video, done upon raw documentary footage of the Portuguese state television RTP. The footage, shot in Lisbon in 1968, consists of a series of street interviews to random passersby, asking them to comment on the recent events of the occupation of Prague by the Warsaw Pact troops. The sound track belonging to this footage is, according to RTP, permanently lost. My intervention upon this material consists of an attempt at recovering the missing document by performing lip reading throughout the footage. Paying a reference to Anri Sala’s 1999 Intervista, I attempt at recovering speech and its political message by visually interpreting the movements of the interviewees’ lips. Not being a professional trained in the technique but performing it exhaustively and until the limit of my capabilities, was aimed at producing a sound track which content results from the mix of lip reading interpretation, previous knowledge of the political situation in Portugal at the time as well as of the mainstream press coverage of the Prague events in the country and a fair amount of my own subconscious projection (including both presumption of what was said and desire towards what could have been said). Dubbing all the “testimonies” with my own voice shows the effort of the process through and reinforces the subjectiveness of the new document.

Palavras de Abril (April Words) is a looped 7 minute long, 4:3 HD mute video. It comprises a mapping of words and terms related and relatable with the Portuguese Carnation Revolution interpreted in Portuguese Sign Language. The video explores the political connotation of terms present in their expression through hand signs. This piece is also responsible for the connection of the hand sign wall paintings with the missing sound track and lip reading intervention in 68: Prague in Lisbon.

Finally and closing the series, V e os outros (V and the Others), a 70 x 100 cm composition of metal pins on velvet, a collection of political pins of Portuguese political parties from around the period of the Carnation Revolution that use a hand or hands as part of their symbols and a pin of the Czechoslovak Civic Forum, which informally adopted the “V for victory” sign as an iconic symbol of the Velvet Revolution and part of their image.

Palavras de Abril (April Words) HD video 4:3, loop, mute
Galerie Hlavního Města Prahy, Prague (2019 CZ)

V e os outros (V and the Others), 70 x 100 cm, metal pins on velvet

68 Praga em Lisboa (68: Prague in Lisbon), video 4:3, 13' stereo sound
Galerie Hlavního Města Prahy, Prague (2019 CZ)

68 Praga em Lisboa (68: Prague in Lisbon), video 4:3, 13' stereo sound
Galerie Hlavního Města Prahy, Prague (2019 CZ)

Palavras de Abril (April Words) HD video 4:3, loop, mute
Galerie Hlavního Města Prahy, Prague (2019 CZ)

68: Praga em Lisboa (68:Prague in Lisbon), Palavras de Abril (April Words) and
V e os outros (V and the Others) installation view
Galerie Hlavního Města Prahy, Prague (2019 CZ)

V e os outros (V and the Others), details

68: Praga em Lisboa (68:Prague in Lisbon) and Palavras de Abril (April Words),
installation view - Galerie Hlavního Města Prahy, Prague (2019 CZ)

V e os outros (V and the Others) and V for MFA, installation view
Galerie Hlavního Města Prahy, Prague (2019 CZ
Photo: GHMP

68: Praga em Lisboa (68:Prague in Lisbon), Palavras de Abril (April Words) and V for OF
Installation view, Galerie Hlavního Města Prahy, Prague (2019 CZ)
Photo: GHMP

V for OF, installation view
Galerie Hlavního Města Prahy, Prague (2019 CZ)

FROM FAT AND THE CITY

THE COLLECTIVE ARCHIVE

LARP

V e os outros (V and the Others), details

V e os outros (V and the Others), details