Porto Design Biennale translates the power of artistic processes amid the pandemic

Porto Design Biennale is a matter of artistic processes and it all started today, 2 June in-between Porto and Matosinhos. This will be so until 25 July, where people of both cities (and of other places, as well) will be able to enjoy exhibitions, workshops and performances , both in-person or following an online agenda , prepared to meet the demands of a pandemic world, still.

This second edition of Porto Design Biennale (PDB) is themed “Alter-Realidades” and brings along 49 activities, from talks to exhibitions and even radio shows. The first two initiatives kicked off this morning at the Casa do Design in Matosinhos, and at the Museu Soares dos Reis. Rui Moreira and Luísa Salgueiro, Mayors of Porto and Matosinhos, respectively, attended the opening activities.

The challenge of organising the PDB 2021 is well known by now, due to the ongoing pandemic, as recalled the Mayor of Porto, Rui Moreira. “We think that, despite everything, it would be important, both for the affirmation of the biennale and the critic and creative fabric, and even to the audiences that it stirs, that this edition would be carried out”, affirmed Rui Moreira.

The Mayor also shared, on the occasion that preceded the opening of the exhibition “Museu da Matéria Viva”, at the Casa do Design in Matosinhos, the idea that “security, which was most justifiable during the pandemic, is drifting a little towards authoritarianism, which even prevents us from living our lives. Hence, doing this type of thing is a nice thing. We cannot let authoritarianism replace prudence, as recommended before”.

Rui Moreira furthered that the accomplishment of such event – PDB – is doubly important because “it is necessary to advance a new ethics in Europe, an existence that harmonizes accountability and happiness”, but also the way PDB “has adapted to the current context, the partnerships it generated, the extension it took, the reinvention of formats and the debates it has issued”. The Mayor of Porto also added that “in such times of radical authority, a radical biennale”, so that we “can go back to being humans”.

In turn, the Mayor of Matosinhos, Luísa Salgueiro, agrees that “it took courage and complicity to decide to maintain the timing of the biennale”, and highlights the importance of the event to “make the region a great pole of life, of attraction, of cultural and economic dynamism. And that is what mobilizes us”. It is important to “put health first, with neglecting the rest of our lives”, affirmed Luísa Salgueiro.

The director of the esad-idea, organiser of the PDB, “going forward with the biennale was a deep respect decision towards the audiences and the cultural agents”. Magda Seifert said that the “PBD programme will be able to open pathways to understanding the way design helps us think and build our place”.

The morning in Matosinhos concluded with a visit to the exhibit “Museu da Matéria Viva”, guided by the PDB curator Alastair Fuad-Luke, who enhanced that, on a daily basis, “we do not build the world on our own, we cocreate the world. It is important to do things together, to change the present.

Bienvenue to the Museu Nacional de Soares dos Reis

Porto Design Biennale proceeded to another site, namely the Museu Nacional de Soares dos Reis, host to the exhibition “Autre”, curated by Sam Baron and Caroline Naphegyi, which celebrates France, as the guest country of this edition of the PDB.

Rui Moreira emphasised the choice of France, a country that is the pillar of liberty and associated to the European civilization. “We have been witnesses and accomplices of the French diplomacy as regards the cultural sector”, recalled Rui Moreira, adding the French collaboration in such programmes as “Days of the Dance”, the revival of Rivoli, of the French cinema and its presentation in the city.

Taking on the great challenge of hosting the Porto Design Biennale, the Director of the Museu Nacional de Soares dos Reis, António Ponte, enhanced that the combination of such activities, as “the project of the Museum with a set of collections by the Museum itself, conveys different interpretations”.

The ambassador of France in Portugal, Florence Mangin, was also present at the Museu Nacional de Soares dos Reis and affirmed that “we received with great pleasure the invitation to be the guest country of PDB, which turn out as the major design event in Portugal”, and enhanced that design is a “contemporary discipline of impending prominence and responsibility in the collective life and in environment survival”.

Sam Baron and Caroline Naphegyi, curators of the exhibition “Autre” explained that lockdown “made us adopt a more critic approach, and in a way, a more activist one”. Hence the contribution of both the Portuguese and the French communities that wished to “show the design’s ability to bring people together”.

Silvia Balea, Attaché for Cultural and audio-visual Cooperation and Manuel de Novaes Cabral, Honorary Consul of France in Porto, as well as Nuno Faria, Director of the Museu da Cidade, also attended the opening of “Autre”.