On April 7, the Portuguese Catholic University (UCP) - Braga hosted the exhibition "Hands on the city. Artistic investigations in the urban environment", from the Serralves Foundation collection, at an opening held in the Júlio Fragata Library of the Faculty of Philosophy and Social Sciences (FFCS).
Developed specifically for the four campuses of the Portuguese Catholic University, the exhibition in Braga is dedicated to the artist, poet and essayist, E. M. de Melo e Castro - a choice that João Duque, Pro-Rector of UCP-Braga, considered fortunate, since his works can be appreciated in a "house that has always been dedicated to philosophical thought and literature".
Melo e Castro's graphic interventions represent the period after April 25, 1974, in which the artist appropriated road signs "as support for political messages that subverted their original meaning.
The president of the Serralves Foundation, Ana Pinho, pointed out that the exhibition is part of the institution's line of programming aimed at democratizing art. "We're going to places where it's difficult to get contemporary art to reach," she said, after João Duque had praised the Serralves Foundation's choice of "touring the country".
Curated by Joana Valsassina, this exhibition is the result of UCP joining the founding body of the Serralves Foundation and is part of the Oporto-based institution's itinerant exhibition program, which aims to make its contemporary art collection accessible to diverse audiences in all regions of the country.
The promoters of 'Hands on the City' maintain that the urban centers where the Catholic University is present are distinct, so the exhibition takes these territories and their different characteristics as its starting point.
The academic community of these four locations thus has access to different parts of a single exhibition, allowing art to reach more and different audiences.
