No place ever vanishes (video installation, 17', 2021)
Developed during the Residir Program artistic residency (Porto/PT, 2021).
The work continues the research developed since 2017 on the wasteland of the former São Vicente de Paulo housing complex, focusing on issues related to the concepts of place, emptiness, memory, resistance, and destruction. "No place ever vanishes" is a video installation consisting of three screens and rubble. It was presented at the final exhibition of Residir, an artist residency program hosted by MIRA FORUM in the summer of 2021.
The videos are based on conversations with four women, representing two generations of former residents of the S. Vicente de Paulo public housing complex. These conversations are interwoven with actual footage of the wasteland and a series of images gathered from official and family archives regarding the former place. The installation aims to uncover the personal narratives of displacement behind the processes of urban transformation.
"No place ever vanishes" is a video installation that contains three videos based on actual and archival images of the former São Vicente de Paulo neighborhood. Two of these videos are based on a series of conversations with four women: Ana Santos, Isabel Vieira, Fátima Cavalheiro, and Manuela Ferreira. These women are former residents of the S.V.P. neighborhood from different ages and generations.
In these videos, the women recount their memories of the neighborhood, try to reconstruct the spatiality of the place, talk about the demolition process, and express their desire to return. The conversations are accompanied by archival images, photographs, and videos provided by the former residents and collected from public archives. Additionally, there are images of the terrain today, which search for traces of the neighborhood and show the perceptible transformations of the space.
The third video, without sound, contrasts two video excerpts: an archive video of residents launching a St. John's balloon over the neighborhood's single-storey houses, and a promotional video of the new municipal project for the area, which shows a set of colossal towers levitating. In this confrontation, with a light tone of serious humor, the artist places hope and sordidness side by side, serving as a provocation to public housing policies that destroy communities.
Having previously worked on the former S.V.P. neighborhood, including as part of her master’s degree in art and public space at the FBAUP, the artist is embracing the residency at a time when a spontaneous movement of former residents is demanding the right to return to the neighborhood."
Text by João Melo, coordinator of the Residir program.
VIDEO'S CREDITS
VoicesAna Santos, Isabel Vieira, Fátima Cavalheiro e Manuela Ferreira
Direction, editing and photographFlora Paim
Editing assistant Lis Paim
Sound editingFlora Paim, Lis Paim e Pedro Emílio Sá
MixingPedro Emílio Sá