• Ana Vieira, Projecto Ocultação/Desocultação, 1978-2010. Installation. Bricks and white vinyl, 10,80 × 4,65 m. Collection of Ana Vieira State. © of the work of art, Ana Vieira State, 2020. Photography: David Bonet
  • Ana Vieira, Projecto Ocultação/Desocultação, 1978-2010 (plant of the installation). Collection of Ana Vieira State. © of the work of art, Ana Vieira State, 2020

Your home, a place full of possibilities

Artist Biography

Ana Vieira (Coimbra, 1940 – Lisbon, 2016) studied painting at Lisbon School of Fine Arts, but soon felt the need to explore other artistic languages, such as sculpture, installation, collage, installation, photomontages, or video. The exhibition “The home and the flight” in Es Baluard Museu is the first solo exhibition dedicated to her work outside her country. Throughout her artistic career we find recurrent themes such as the desire to give visibility to the relationship of the subject and their context, especially the situation of women, who have traditionally been confined to the domestic space and are one of the groups who suffer the most in times of crisis.

Artwork explanation

In the installation Projecto Ocultação/Desocultação (Hiding/Unhiding Project) (1978-2010) Ana Vieira presents us the floor plan of a house, marking the architectural boundaries of the home with common elements of construction such as bricks. Instead of telling us the name of each room as in the architectural plans, Ana Vieira wrote down her wishes, things she would like to do, incorporating daily activities, but also longings for the future. If you look closely at the floor plan, could you guess where the kitchen, bathroom, dining room, and bedrooms would be?

In Ana Vieira’s work, the internal and external spaces of the house enter into dialogue, the doors represent the space “between” (the intimacy of our homes and experiences outside). When we walk through the front door, we do so full of stories, both from inside and outside the house. What experiences and dreams do you share with the world and which ones do you keep for the privacy of your homes?

Ana Vieira deals with the situation of women in the house, responsible for the organization of most homes, of moments of loneliness doing a little recognised job that she herself admits she didn’t like very much. Reading the messages she has written we can sense the dreams she had, what she liked to do, beyond everyday life, daily routines and housework. At the entrance of the house she writes, here I want to see enter (Aqui quero ver entrar), at the foot of the window he says here I would like to look (Aqui gostaria d’olhar) and in one of the rooms: Here I will know how to discover (aqui saberei descobrir). For Vieira, the house represents a space linked to memory and identity, to affections and relationships, and also a place full of possibilities yet to be discovered, a projected and desired space where dreams, hopes and desires have a place.

Imagine walking through these rooms and hallways, what would you write where it says here… (aquí…) what dreams would you like to fulfil?

How to participate

Get inspired by Ana Vieira’s work and think of your home as a place of new possibilities!

As you have seen, in part, the home is for this artist a place of daily routines that are not always desired. During the lockdown you will surely have felt at some point that that it was tiring for you to be at home and you had the desire to get out of this space and stop doing the same things. Luckily as “Ocultação/Desocultação” reflects on, the house is also a space of desire and possibility. In this activity we would like to challenge you to think about how to transform your home so that is different form how you have lived it so far during this long lockdown.

  • Choose the space in your home that you most like to transform. Take a photograph or make a drawing to show us how it is.
  • Think about how the room you have chosen could be transformed to see it differently, and live it as if it were new. What changes could you make so that the space looks different? How could you have more space to play? Do you fancy eating or resting in a place where you don’t normally do it, or do in a different way? Could you find your own space? There are a thousand possible ways to recompose our everyday space. We offer you two, choose the one you like the best!

Option 1

  • Sometimes something as simple as redistributing furniture and other items can work wonders! Rearrange the space based on how you decide you would like it to be. Move everything you need!
  • As Ana Vieira does, you can also use text to express those wishes and longings you have about this space. Write them on the floor! You can do this with masking’s tape, washi tape, or simply by writing the sentences on paper. There are as many options as tools you have on hand in your homes!
  • Photograph how the space looks once transformed.

Option 2

  • Make a model (a small three-dimensional representation) to show us how you would like to transform the room you have chosen. You can use coloured paper, cardboard, recycled objects, or a shoe box. As we said, there are as many options as tools you have on hand!
  • Photograph the model.
  • Send the photograph  to us, together with the initial photograph you made to show us the space you have re-imagined, to noufuturdesdecasa@esbaluard.org
  • We will collect all your contributions and publish them through our website and the museum’s social media.

Results

Candela – Ejercicio de estilo 5

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21st May 2020 → 31st May 2020