Culture

Serralves em Festa returns after three years long hiatus

  • Article

    Article

#fib_casa_serralves.jpg

Filipa Brito

The 17th edition of Serralves em Festa takes place this weekend. Aimed for different audiences, free of charge, at different times and with different artistic expressions, the event returns after a three-year hiatus dictated by the pandemic. The last edition was held in 2019 and received around 250,000 people.

On June 2nd, 3rd, and 4th, from Friday night to Sunday night, Serralves will host a unique party. There will be 50 non-stop hours of shows for all tastes. However, the initiative also extends to the outside world, starting this Thursday, June 1st, and will pass through the Downtown area, Praça dos Leões, Praça Carlos Alberto and Cordoaria, as well as the Lapa Church and Jardim do Morro, in Vila Nova de Gaia.

In Largo Amor de Perdição (at 10.:30am), in Gomes Teixeira (at 5pm) and Carlos Alberto (at 6.30pm) squares and in Jardim do Morro, the contemporary circus of Groupe Acrobatique de Tanger and Maroussia Diaz Verbèke and the plays "Approach 18/Stairs/Olivier/Touch", by Yoann Bourgeois, and "Une partie de Soi", by João Paulo Santos, will entertain the two cities. In turn, the Lapa Church, at 9.30 p.m., will host the interdisciplinary group gamut inc for an electroacoustic music concert.

50 hours of performances

From music to performance, circus arts, dance and cinema, there will be a broad range of activities for 50 hours. Therefore, in music, the highlights will be the presence of 808 State & Michael England, pioneers of "acid house", Mouse on Mars, Rui Reininho, the South Africans BCUC, Oren Ambarchi & João Pais Filipe, and the North American Sarathy Korwar.

In the performing arts, Serralves em Festa will present the contemporary circus show "FIQ! (Réveille-toi)", by the acrobatic group from Tangiers, created in 2003 by Sonae El Kamouni, and in contemporary dance, the highlight will be "The Goldberg Variations", by Michiel Vandevelde, who will be accompanied by Audrey Merilus and Oskar Stalpaert, who reflect on the current state of dance, but also on the state of democracy and on different forms of physicality.

"Aqui, Agora, Neste Momento", a project developed by Vera Mantero, Elisabete Francisca and Mariana Tengner Barros around improvisation as a fundamental practice in the performing arts, and "A Barricada", by Brazilian choreographer Marcelo Evelin, are the highlights in contemporary dance.

Serralves em Festa will, as always, have a programme planned for families and children: "El Gran Final", a tragicomedy that bases its essence on the meeting of two clowns, separated for many years following the outbreak of a civil war, by the company Bucraá Circus, and "Gnoma", a puppet show about the challenge of friendship as well as tolerance and new family structures.

STCP boosts transport connections

For travelling to Serralves, STCP will ensure continuous bus connections, even during the dawn hours of Saturday (June 3rd) and Sunday (June 4th). As such, there will be a reinforcement of the surrounding lines and a shuttle service (Vaivém) connecting Serralves to Boavista, more specifically to the Casa da Música Metro during the day, and to Aliados during the night and at dawn.

Connected with line 203 (Marquês-Castelo do Queijo), the shuttle service guarantees a frequency of just over 20 minutes, between 9am and 2pm, on both days. From 2pm and until 9pm, the service will be reinforced, allowing a frequency of just 10 minutes on this route, which connects the Fundação de Serralves to the metro, parking lots and other bus lines.

On Sunday, this special service will be extended from 9pm until 11pm, after the closing of the event, with a frequency of 15 minutes, to ensure the transport "back home" to the last visitors.

On Friday night and early Saturday morning, the shuttle will connect Serralves to Aliados, in an articulated operation with the 502 line (Bolhão-Matosinhos Mercado), ensuring a 25-minute frequency between 9pm on Friday and 1am on Saturday. From then on, until 6 a.m., a 60-minute frequency will be guaranteed on this service.

During the following night and dawn, from Saturday to Sunday, between 9 p.m. and 1 a.m., there will be a 15-minute frequency between Serralves and Aliados and, between 1am and 6am, a 60-minute frequency, always ensuring the connection to the dawn network, which allows reaching all the main axes of the city of Porto and the five other municipalities served by STCP (Vila Nova de Gaia, Gondomar, Maia, Matosinhos and Valongo).

In real time schedules, the special service will be identified as "Shuttle".