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Saga
Sismógrafo - Porto September 14 - November 2 2024 The noun “saga” has its etymology fixed in Latin, designating (in the feminine gender) a sorceress, a fortune-teller or a seer, a practitioner of magical phenomena, endowed with supernatural powers, particularly wise and experienced. In the Portuguese language, the noun has acquired its heritage mainly from Old Norse, referring to a particular way of telling or narrating real or fictional episodes, along with the discursive peculiarity found in its Latin root – the aforementioned magical or supernatural phenomena– which allows such episodes to be projected into an epic, superhuman and, to a certain extent, intangible and enchanting dimension. In these tales, human figures, animals, and objects acquire extraordinary powers and their actions, somewhat regular, seem to rely on an intelligence of their own, reserved for the most special creatures, who have access to the secrets and mysteries of a world that exists beyond the immediate law of things, a marvelous world. Bernardo Simões Correia has been developing an interesting path centered on a plastic research around images, their spectral and phantasmatic condition, their qualities and conditioning factors and around the immense field of visuality as a tool for interacting with the world in its multiple dimensions. He is interested in the mechanisms of reproduction –from analog to digital media, from two-dimensionality to three-dimensionality– which allow him to experiment in the real world, with great freedom and sophistication, different possibilities of media for the fixation of these ghosts. We speak metaphorically of ghosts, insofar as his images stem from imagined visions, produced by the body – the result of a combination of very diverse references – but disembodied until the ultimate moment of their fixation. As spectators, we find ourselves beset, disturbed, and challenged by questions: Where do these images come from? What is their destination? And in what way do they seem to evoke so many other possible images, traversing time and consecrating themselves, in the manner of an epic narrative, in the magnitude of their imagined condition? With the necessary wit characteristic of artists, Bernardo Simões Correia seems to think of the exhibition as a special moment of encounter, as a moment of closeness between the images (presented in their most diverse forms, scales and techniques) that seeks not only to fix their impermanent condition, but also to promote their dialoguing and discursive coexistence, allowing the viewers the experience of deciphering understood as an event that brings them closer to that slight touch of the marvelous. Ana Anacleto Saga, 2024 Installation 2 Digital prints on nautical canvas, 1000 x 200 cm (each) 16 Brass cast sculptures, various sizes Untitled, 2024 oil pastel on plywood 13,7 x 20 cm |
