BRUNO DE ALMEIDA

Crossing Bodies, Crossing Boundaries

Mixed Media on Paper – 90cm x 400cm

After immersing myself in Brussels with 43 other artists from 14 European countries, I returned to Portugal with the purpose of developing a practice that simulates the different relationships and collisions we are exposed to throughout our daily journey.

The developed practice resulted in a collective drawing workshop that sought to answer the question: “Is it still possible to imagine ways of living together?”

Through this practice, participants from different cultures and countries, residing in the city of Porto, used paper to create relationships and negotiations with each other, reflecting and blurring the ideas of boundaries between the individual and the collective. This creative process stimulated critical thinking, where participants observed how an artistic practice can support democracy by highlighting that coexistence in plural spaces.

Through drawing, participants were able to explore ways to strengthen democracy by being exposed to a relational exercise that requires the maintenance of the individual plan for the collective, reflecting the importance of each person’s political participation in a democratic society.

Drawing is a form of negotiation, where one learns to cooperate with existing lines that cross the paper and can divide or integrate. By approaching this practice with distinct groups, tensions emerge from participants when drawing collectively, without nullifying existing individualities. This critical and expressive practice emphasizes the need to develop the capacity to live together in democratic contexts, where freedom of expression is an important aspect.

The practice carried out through the use of drawing and imagination indicates that it is possible to imagine and create ways of living together. By bringing together diverse bodies in a space of collective creation, concrete steps are proposed for the construction of inclusive places.

Participants: Abner Samuel Godinho Firmino, Ana Sofia Lopes, Danilo Dante, Daniela Gomes, Francisco Pereira, Gustavo Borges Mariano, Laura Oliveira, Leonardo Campos, Luana Oliveira, Marcela Pedersen, Melina Scheurmann, Natália Fernandes, Nurian Brandão, Rafael Campos, René Gaertner, Rosinda Casais, Shanaia de Sousa, Sylvia Pereira, Thiago Franco, Thamirys Vitória Hora Almeida