Christmas has become for many people, a quite unpleasant season. The world’s absolute commercialization, responsible for the transformation of every little aspect of our life into merchandise on sale, has made this time a whirlwind of pressure that forces us to be happy and have what is known as good feelings, even against our own reality and the world itself, which at the same time, the consumer society itself is responsible for presenting as quite impossible, apart from spending excessive, disproportionate amounts of money.

This increases the frustration, depression and dysfunctional feelings of those, who even going into debt can’t follow the prescribed rhythm that the mass media and street signs suggest, nor are fortunate to enjoy an emotional health and / or sentimental up to the highly publicized through all kinds of reified contemporary fiction. We live in a terribly dehumanized society and not because of its high technological development, but because of the sinister use of that technology should be used precisely to liberate the potential of humanity and its relationship to the environment is an inseparable part and however used most often as a tool to control production and alienating and heartless.

The number of social and commercial pressures reaches a exorbitant number during this season, increasingly outrageously hypocritical and false, in which the most of the people represent an empty sham and regulated in the which they have to spend time performing the most grotesque activities, even opposing their inclinations, in a whirlpool of unfortunate events of which the reflection and pleasure are conspicuous by their absence. Intensive preparation for the year.

However, even for the greatest of the skeptics, it is not easy to deny that this is by far one of the most magical seasons of the year. As its name suggests, at Christmas we celebrate a birth, and we do it as sort of one way or another all over the world for thousands of years. Because what is the symbolic figure of Christ is nothing else than the Sun, born during the Winter Solstice giving rise to a new cycle where the days are once again getting a little longer inviting the epiphany, life and melting to be announced soon with all its immense possibilities. The cyclic eternal mystery of becoming involved in their own magic.

For all the above, it seems appropriate that the famous Cirque de Soleil comes to Lisbon (http://www.pavilhaoatlantico.pt/vEN/Agenda/Agenda/Pages/evento.aspx?eventoID=1193) from the 21^st of December to the 8^th of January, with its show Alegría, which affirms the joy of living and hope even in the toughest and most ruthless situations in life.

Paul Oilzum

Bitter reflection, sad and dark on abuses of power, and the necessity of freedom. Alegria is one of the signature shows (almost 20 years represented) by this famous and singular circus that presents a show without animals. With a Canadian origin, it is famous, because of the imagination and the special importance given to the most plastics. If you rent apartments in Lisbon maybe you feel like celebrating Christmas with them.

Contact Me 

Translated by: Hans
Contact Me

His writings are some of the most important of the 20th century, and it’s since the different voices that he created, since his different heteronyms, he built a poetic universe of multiple universes, in which characters such as Alberto Caeiro, Alvaro de Campos, Bernardo Soares and Ricardo Reis handle different writing registers, each with its own characteristics, style and language. Today, they talk daily about Anonymous on the social networks, and they find in the figure of anonymity an answer to political action, the creation of situations of protest and a critique of the current political catastrophe. Anonymity becomes a tool to extend information and community dialogue. In Pessoa’s case, the mark of anonymity also worked to go into coordinates of himself which, under his own name, wouldn’t have been possible.

Anonymity or the manipulation of other names to configure creative works has always been present in the different registers of universal art; be it painting, sculpture, performance, novel, the use of negation of one’s name and the calling to the creation of a new ‘real’ figure which is used as a presentation of artistic work has been used both to promote bigger expressive possibilities and breaking moral and thought barriers, as well as creating fictions inside the fictitious world of artistic creation.

In everyday life, in reality, the effort in highlighting a name which gives value to that in what one takes positions towards the world from art, politics or human relations, doesn’t stop being part of the process to capitalize, from the unity of the name, another social product which the system often strives to construct an identity, in the same way that it classifies and bounds us, giving us a forced freedom with the dilemmas that it involves; having a name, an image, a window to social networks doesn’t necessarily mean that the character of the individuals is authentic, versatile or independent, all the opposite.

We find ourselves in an entanglement of meanings and signifiers, in which identity always competes to make itself a space inside a community, without any clear autonomy. In the work of Pessoa, this becomes intangible in the writing itself, in that the poet, through his heteronyms, gives himself the faculty to divide himself in all the people and personalities that configure his self conscience-intelligence. Like an included operation of uprising against the poetic-literary system always ruled by the interests which surpass the value of the work or the talent of its author, Pessoa and his heteronyms revert this stagnant way, giving a bigger expressive load and universal condition to the writing with its different tones.

Pessoa is the poet of Lisbon par excellence. His universal character is a recommended reading for those who want to understand the character of this city on a much closer level.

Alexa Ray

Get apartments in Lisbon and get to know a bit more of the life of Fernando Pessoa, the streets that he walked and the worlds that he saw and made possible in his writings. The voyage of poetry isn’t just in the books but also in the streets where, still, poetry runs, makes spaces and new encounters. Lisbon is waiting for you.

Contact Me 

Translated by: aleixgwilliam
Contact Me

Not only in his first film, ‘Summer In the City’ (1970), which gets its name from a song by the Californian band The Lovin’ Spoonful and has the subtitle as a tribute to The Kinks – whose music is probably the true protagonist of the film and articulates admirably the urban wandering of the antihero Hans, recently out of prison, around the streets of Berlin – Wim Wenders places on record his love for music and the essential importance which he gives it in his films. In a previous short movie made with the writer Peter Handke, ‘Tres long plays americanos’, he had already testified it in a beautiful way. It’s a peculiar road movie in which Wenders and Handke comment on the rock songs which come from the tuned in radio station in the car in which they’re in, while the camera focuses slowly on the places where the vehicle goes past at the same time that it leaves the city to enter a suburban area of car cemeteries, factories and large advertising boards.

If road movies and music, inseparable forever after the legendary film ‘Easy Rider’ with Dennis Hopper and Peter Fonda, are two constants since the beginning of Wenders’ classic film, they both converge in the city of Lisbon in various films which we will mention in an inverse chronological order.

In ‘Lisbon Story’ (1994), the protagonist Philip Winter, a character which had already appeared in other films by Wenders, quite notably in the extraordinary ‘Alice in the cities’ made twenty years before, goes through all of Europe in a car from Germany to Lisbon, listening to the music which is played on the radio stations of different countries which he’s going through, until he’s seduced and enchanted by the Portuguese capital, both by the spirit of Pessoa as by the music of Madredeus, authors of a strikingly beautiful soundtrack.

Meanwhile, ‘Until the End of the World’ (1991), is probably the biggest delirium of road movies in a way which is similar to, commenting on Proust’s work, Gilles Deleuze said that the skies are the delirium of love. It’s a multiple disparate persecution around the world in search of a camera which has the power of recording images which can be seen by the blind, which is probably not exaggerate to think (despite it’s quite a few faults related mainly with an imposed reduction on the original duration of the film and finely compensated by its lyricism and magic) as Wenders’ last greatest film. Its soundtrack isn’t below the standards of trying and it gathers a collection of extraordinary songs, included some hypnotic songs by pygmies, with artists such as Talking Heads, Neneh Cherry, Crime and The City Solution, Lou Reed, Elvis Costello, R.E.M., Patti and Fred Smith, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, Depeche Mode, Daniel Lanois or U2, amny of them composed ex profeso for the occasion, such as the wonderful Fretless.

Paul Oilzum

If you rent apartments in Lisbon you’ll find out that the city, just like it happens sometimes with films, is absolutely inseparable from the singular and indescribable musical qualities which are entirely its own.

Contact Me 

Translated by: aleixgwilliam
Contact Me

Without doubt, the most interesting thing in Portugal’s biggest art gallery, the National Museum of Ancient Art or the ‘Janelas Verdes’ Museum as it’s popularly known, is the interesting selection of Renaissance paintings. And it’s for both quality and quantity. The visitor who goes inside the door on the yellow façade of this old Portugues palace will find that the museum is, roughly, divided in two clearly differentiated areas: on one hand the national artists paintings and, on the other, the work of European artists. Both in one and the other the works from the Renaissance literally shine.

The traveller shouldn’t expect to find great works with heroic themes or a wide range of portraits of royalty. What the National Museum of Ancient Art holds is quite different, because the small and medium panels of purely religious themes are those that stand out, which are executed with a spectacular colouring (reds, blues, greens or yellows) and with that delicate stroke which characterizes the work of this period of time. And this has a pretty simple explanation because, this art gallery, contrary to other big European museums (like the Louvre or El Prado) isn’t made up with collections which come from royal funds but with works which were kept in monasteries and churches. The Portuguese confiscation which took place in 1834, took every single possession from the religious orders (including works of art) and, with this particular legacy, they made a large museum which, at the end of the 19th century, it separated into three different entities: the National Archeological Museum, the National Museum of Ancient Art and the Contemporary Art Museum. They’re all located in Lisbon.

In order not to saturate the eye sight, it’s recommended for the visitor to do, at least, two visits. With the first one he can enjoy the religious panels which belonged to the Portuguese school, among which the enormous panels of ‘Saint Vincent de Fora’ stand out, which were made by Nuno Gonçalves, an artist who also carried out the disturbing ‘Saint Vincent tied up to a column’. But if there’s a work in the Portuguese school which is worth looking at for more than ten minutes that is, without doubt, the ‘Ecce Homo’, which was made in the mid 15th century by an anonymous artist. The panel represents Christ with his hands tied and his head covered by a cloth, in an unconventional image of the sacrifice of Jesus.

If we’ve booked the second day to enjoy the panels of the European school, we can choose between the works of the predecessor of surrealism, Hyeronimus Jeroen van Aeken, known in the art world as El Bosco, representing a triptych  on the ‘Temptations of Saint Anthony’, a spectacular panel of the scholar ‘Saint Jerome’ from the hand of the German artist Durer, reminding us of our mortality, ‘The Miracle of Saint Eusebius of Cremona’ by Rafael Sanzio or the ‘Saint Augustine’ by Piero della Francesca.

The curious visitor that goes inside the National Museum of Ancient Art can also not take any notice of these recommendations and prefer to wander around the different rooms of the art gallery without a fix direction, allowing himself to be trapped, randomly, by any of these magnificent ancient panels.

More information on the official website: http://www.mnarteantiga-ipmuseus.pt/

Candela Vizcaíno

Remember to book one of the apartments in Lisbon to be able to see the Portuguese capital calmly, because you’ll need a few days to do so.

Contact Me 

Translated by: aleixgwilliam
Contact Me

There is a place you must visit if you come to Lisbon, the Castelo de São Jorge or Castle of St. George. Currently, we can only admire the ruins of the original castle, known as Castelo dos Mouros, located in Lisbon’s highest hill, the hill of St. George. From its remains, visitors can admire some of the best views of Lisbon on the Tagus River estuary.

Besides the towers, watchtowers, moats and yards full of peacocks, there is a recommended attraction for those who have never been in a dark chamber. It is one of the most emblematic and ancient towers that still stand, the Tower of Ulysses, which is located in the dark chamber, designed by Leonardo da Vinci in the sixteenth century and the only one country.

What is exactly the dark chamber? This is a lens system that produces an optical effect, through which the scenes taking place outside the tower are reflected in a concave white screen. It is a term first conceived by Johannes Keplerin in a treaty, which explains the operation of this device, precursor of the telescope, although the Arabs in the late tenth century were already aware of this optical phenomenon.

Leonardo Da Vinci, encouraged the development of the dark chamber with the aim of deepening the functioning of the vision, adding a lens to the hole through which light enters allowing sharper images.

What the visitor can admire is a black-painted room in complete darkness. There is a reflected image falling on a mirror placed at the top of the tower, in a concave white surface, allowing a 360° view as if we were in very top of the tower. If you turn this surface or move around you can see all the different angles that this device captures.

The projected image is in color and very bright, reflecting what is taking place outside of the tower in real time. Because of the focal distance between the main lenses, the result makes the objects located at great distance appear to be close.

And we can play with people who are walking down the street, we can take the cars and return them without suffering any damage, we become voyeurs for several minutes.

This attraction has a limited capacity so that all people can enjoy it; the sessions usually last between 15 and 20 minutes. A guide explains how the system is showing us the history of the city through this wonderful optical property that allows us to see beyond our eyes.

The history of the dark chamber is a scientific and a recreational one, it served to enliven the party of the nobles.

Ara

Lisbon in Portugal is full of wonderful secrets. Rent apartments in Lisbon and make sure to visit the emblematic St. George’s Castle and go to the Tower of Ulysses to enjoy second to none panoramic views.

Contact Me 

Translated by: Hans
Contact Me

The Jerónimos Monastery in Lisbon in Saint Mary of Belém, which is its whole name, is probably the most famous monument in Lisbon. Located in front of the spectacular Praça do Império and close to the photogenic Tower of Belém, inside you have to distinguish two different spaces. And it has to be done because the building dates are different and, therefore, there’s a variation in the project and the style. We start at the beginning so we don’t get lost. After the return of Vasco da Gama from his Indian expedition, opening the way for the trade with the necessary spices (we have to remember that, at a time without electric refrigeration, pepper, cinnammon or cloves prolonged the preservation of food), the King Manuel I, also known as ‘the fortunate’, ordered to build a monastery to be used as a royal mausoleum, as well as a place of royal representation and his new found power.

And so, in 1514, with the benefit from some spices, it began to be built on the land of an old church, a big monastery that belonged to the order of the Jerónimos. The building, although it went through the hands of various architects, is carried out following an established project that followed the new Manueline style, which isn’t anything other than a new way of late Gothic. They use carved stone to lift practically naked walls and they left the decoration for the windows, friezes, columns or the towers. As it was usual at this time (beginning of the Italian Renaissance), the decorative motives were taken from the wide catalogue of symbols handled daily by the intellectuals of the time. The sculpted shells and fish, artichokes and pineapples, griffins and lions, following specific symbols that the contemporary western world has not forgotten.

The traveller that goes inside the building can’t miss out on the magnificent cloister with its balustrades and arches which are profusely decorated. Nor can he/she miss out on checking out the fountain of the patio with the representation of a lion (symbol of Saint Jerónimo and his order and, according to the interpretatitons of C.G. Jung, of the tamed unconscious forces). Another thing that can’t be missed is the old refectory decorated with the typical Portuguese tiles, nor the impressive nave of the church of Saint Mary, which is held by tall and thin columns. THe Jerónimos Monastery is, also, a mausoleum which serves as a tomb for Portuguese kings (Manuel I of Portugal and his wife, John III of Portugal with all his family, the young Sebastian ‘the desired’…) and illustrious Portuguese figures (Vasco da Gama or the poets Camôes and Pessoa).

The other building (nearly forgot about it!) is an annex built in the middle of the 19th century imitating the Manueline style and, therefore, less authentic and interesting than the original. It currently holds the National Archeology Museum, an institution that, for its complexity and importance, deserves a separate outlook.

The Jéronimos Monastery is, in definitive, the perfect symbol for the power that came with overseas trading and contacts. Also, in December 2007, all the heads of state of the European Union sealed by protocol the Treaty of Lisbon in this building.

Candela Vizcaíno

From one of the apartments in Lisbon you’ll be able to get, walking or by tram, to this exclusive area of the Portuguese capital.

Contact Me 

Translated by: aleixgwilliam
Contact Me

The National Antiga Museum of Lisbon exhibits confrontos: Bosch and his circle made up of three large paintings until the 25th of September. The works are exhibited for the first time in Portugal and are part of the Groeninge Museum of Brugge and lent to the Museum Antiga in Lisbon.

The exhibition is a search to find the common traces the Flemish painter Hieronymus Bosch, known as El Bosco had through the Triptych masterpiece “Judgement Day” and his colleagues, as opposing to The temptations Triptych owned by the San Antonio Museum of  Antiga Art along with the triptych of “The Final Judgement” and the deprivation of Job Triptych property the Groeninge Museum. This process was carried thru out extensive testing and research supported in special laboratories.

Bosch is considered one of the most enigmatic painters for his dream symbolism was not proper at all  of his period. The representations and symbols are an exquisite and refined satire of its time, it shows monstrous beings and surreal morality incorporated in the ruling powers of his time.

His paintings have the distinction of not being signed and therefore many of them can be confused with the paintings of his inner circle. They stand out by representing deities and saints as ordinary and vulnerable figures leading to empathize with their images.

Despite being almost a contemporary of Jan van Eyck his aesthetic representation techniques are markedly different  While  Bosco used the  alla prima technique, Van Eyck was a avid investigator learning the interpretation of the Bible along with new pictorial technique.

Alla prima technique, is where the paint layer is not diluted with any solvent,  therefore are no problems of adding layers, reducing the risk of cracking, but requiring extreme safety in the application of  form and color by the artist. The work is completed in one session, which meant that the Bosco had to make a detailed project draft of each work, with details of the paintings, the colors, shades and contrasts.

The leaflets are exceptional works of Hieronymus Bosch altarpiece made in three parts. In it, the main work is in the center. Each party is riddled with myths and profane images constructed with an array of unparalleled fantasy which was inspirational to paintings five centuries later, represented by surrealism.

The Garden of Earthly Delights triptych is the most famous one  and was known as  the Madroño painting. In this triptych Bosch represents the creation of the world according to religion. In the center is the garden of Eden or the Garden of Earthly Delights, on the right, you find the creation of Adam and Eve and on the left hell. A whole trilogy of good and evil at its pure source.

For more information http://www.mnarteantiga-ipmuseus.pt/

Nancy Guzman

You cannot get lost, September must be a month to enjoy a few pleasant days apartments in Lisbon so you can visit this trilogy about Bosco and his circle.

Contact Me 

Translated by: Marc
Contact Me

The list of books which mention Lisbon is a long one. So many of them hope to trap the essence of the city in their pages, and very few achieve it – but even smaller is the number of books which, just like Duchamps’ tiny pharmacy syringe which contained the air of Paris, have actually encapsulated that special poetic, and devastatingly melancholic essence.

Echoing the maxim of Valery that a poem is never finished, it is abandoned, the Book of Disquiet is a work undoubtedly, and unavoidably unfinished. Its cosmology is not dissimilar to those which posit infinite, parallel universes in perpetual expansion, with its equally endless nature.

The book’s authorship has been attributed to book keeper’s assistant Bernardo Soares, of all the many people from the times of Pessoa, after his own confession, which came the closest to fitting the mystery of the book’s content; “whilst the personality is not mine; it is not different to mine, it is a mutilation of it.”

A deeply paradoxical mutilation in any case, as life has trouble breathing without an identity, and so Soares emerges from the pages as a kind of mystic without faith, a dreamer who doesn’t scorn or criticise those paths with no pure reason; a writer who writes his autobiography in prose; an autobiography without events, in the form of a diary full of aphorisms and digressions which cannot hide or embellish the poet which lurks between the lines.

Pessoa himself, in the wistful, sad, enigmatic prologue to the book, presents to us the moment of meeting him. Both had been distracted, and curious about a fight which had taken place on the street, in a food house which looked like a restaurant, in a city with no train, which they both frequented.

Around 30 years old, his pale, pallid face gave off an air of vague suffering – a suffering which had over time crystallised to the point of indifference. Soares was a solitary figure who barely went to class, or joined any groups or clubs, or established any meaningful bonds with anybody. With the exception, that is, of Pessoa himself, to whom he only approached in order to leave him the very book which we see today, fifty years after his death.

Perhaps that’s why it is like we are listening to a voice from the grave when we lose ourselves in the fascinating, beautiful pages, as he talks to us, with hypnotic melancholy; with a slow, beating rhythm, of the rain, of the loss of faith, of the gods, of ancient cults, of the musical quality of cars, of the world of tobacco, of the pain of happiness, of the flight path of the seagulls, the resting places of the soul, of tiredness, exhaustion, of the notion of life as a Whole which weighs upon the shoulders of thought…

Paul Oilzum

The four hidden letters in the Torah are said to form the secret name of god – revealing him as the true protagonist of the book. There’s no better book to get stuck into when you rent apartments in Lisbon

Contact Me 

Translated by: Poppy
Contact Me

The Chiado National Contemporary Art Museum of Lisbon presents in its art video programme the exhibition Poetic things that are political until August 21st. The exhibition which has been commissioned by Miguel Amado is a co-production between the Chiado Museum and Duplacena-Fuso.

The art exhibition with explicit political meaning takes on the investigation of different video works that take on, in a political way, the socio-political conflicts of globalization and post-colonialism in different parts of the world. With that aim it chooses a series of art videos that haven’t been exhibited in any Portuguese museum.

The moving image (video) means an ideal registration to capture reality with its complexities, building a testimony of every day and social lifestyle transformations. Thanks to this capacity of capturing the symbolic dimension of reality and building new territories of sensibility exploring frictional ways, it has transformed into an ideal support to embody works of art that, in any other day, would go without registering.

That’s why the artists such as Katarina Zdjelar from Serbia, the Americans Chelsea Knight and Austin Shull, Daniel Jewesbury from Northern Iteland, Cao Fei from China, Nazito Mosquito de Bofa from Angola, Nira Pereg from Israel and Rita Sobral from Portugal, have made use of the video to produce the works that are shown in this exhibition.

Conceptual artist Katarina Zdjelar explores the notions of identity, authority and community through narratives of memory, where it includes book texts and a special work on language, as notion of change. In the work which is exhibited, Zdjelar takes an Italian community that look to transform its reality to capture the poetics of collective and individual transformation. In 2009 she participated in the Serbian Pavillion in Venice’s Biennale.

The Chinese artist Cao Fei expresses the particular sensitivity and ancestral aesthetics that Sabbath has in an ultra-orthodox Jewish community in Jerusalem. His work that took place in 2008 is fundamentally focused on exploring the Jewish culture and religion, going in depth in the complex relations that it has with politics and the armed conflict which is going on in the region. Sabbath is the story of a barricade that takes place every Friday in a Jerusalem neighbourhood to stop the entry of intruders to the sanctity of the Sabbath day.

The rest of the works refer to different political conflicts that have made up part of local cultures, such as the catholic-protestant conflict in Ireland and the colonial influence between Africans and Europeans, or the confinement phenomenon in the United States.

For more information: http://www.museudochiado-ipmuseus.pt/en/node/1059

Nancy Guzman

A great exhibition that makes us think about the poetics of politics in art is what the Chiado Museum offers. So, if you’re interested in politics and art and you’re in one of our apartments in Lisbon spending a few enjoyable summer days, this exhibition is a good prospect.

Contact Me 

Translated by: aleixgwilliam
Contact Me

Other Perspectives: Works in Focus will be on at Lisbon’s Chiado Museum until the 18th December. The show aims to place a global focus on the collection at the National Museum of Contemporary Art – Museum Chiado – whilst also offering a panoramic view of Portuguese art, spanning chronologically from Romanticism (1850-1880) right up to the contemporary period of the 21st century.

The exhibition, commissioned by Elena Barranha and Rui Afonso Santos, was put together by selected cultural figures – art historians, curators and artists – who were invited to choose an artwork from the collection to represent the different periods.

The show will be open to the public on the 18th of every month until this December. Each piece is accompanied by a text, and brief description of the artist, and the work. The content of the exhibition will also be reproduced in a catalogue, which will include extra images and texts from the historians, explaining their choices in more detail, forming a comprehensive look back at Portuguese art of the last two centuries.

The Chiado Museum was founded by the Portuguese government on 26th May 1911, and grew as a division of the old National Museum of Fine Art – a part of the National Museum of Ancient Art in the ancient San Francisco convent which was later remodeled by Modernist Jean Michel Willmotte. The early pieces at the Other Perspectives exhibition, which date from 1850, were lent by the National Museum of Ancient Art.

The museum holds around 5,000 pieces of art – paintings, sculptures, design objects and photographs which span the Romantic, Naturalist, Neorealism, Surrealism and Abstract eras of Portuguese art.

The collection is the product of a desire to place a spotlight on the history of vanguard art – and to bring together more traditional styles whilst also taking a critical look at contemporary Portuguese art.

The collection starts with Romanticism, in the middle of the 19th century, with artists such as Tomás de la Anunciación and Cristino da Silva – going on to Naturalism, represented by artists such as Miguel Ángel Lupi and Columbano Bordallo Pinheiro. With the turn of the century comes the symbolism of Antonio Sousa López, and the expressionism of Mario Eloy. Political and social critique has always been present in the Portuguese art movements, and was particularly prevalent during the Surrealism and Abstract eras around the 1940s. But it was the 1960s which saw the arrival of the vanguard, with the Portuguese interpretation of Pop Art, and the various different styles which have marked the present period.

For more information http://www.museudochiado-ipmuseus.pt/en/node/787

Nancy Guzman

Other Perspective is an interesting new exhibition which traces the history and evolution of Portuguese art. If you happen to be in Lisbon don’t miss out on this show, on until December 2011. And what better way to make the most of the charm of the city than renting Lisbon accommodation .

Contact Me 

Translated by: Poppy
Contact Me