The following text was written by Dori Nigro and Paulo Pinto, and was co-commissioned as part of our Live Art Writers Network (LAWN) project at Citemor Festival, Portugal, during the first two weeks of August 2024. Previous writing about the festival and performances can be found here. Live Art Writers Network is a network aimed at cultivating experimental writing practices happening in dialogue with performance and live art, find out more about the program here. All LAWN 2024 commissions are published in our performingborders Pamphlet #6.

This text is translated by Tito Pedrinho Fael from the original text in Portuguese. You can find the original Portuguese language text here.

Listen to the text:

Overflights and breadth

When Xavier de Sousa invited us to take a look at the Citemor’24 festival, we sensed this was a different space from the ones we’d been to before.

Leaving Porto in the direction of Montemor-o-Velho by train brought us into contact with urban and rural landscapes in poetic movements. These landscapes preceded the promise of an encounter with a part of the history of performance in Portugal, which has been continually redesigning itself far from hegemonic spaces for over 50 years.

Each drawing of houses and greenery framed in the train’s windows seemed to form a photo album and memories of a festival that is based on experimentation, performative provocation, celebration of the creation of the Iberian scene, and the affections sewn together in creative sharing over the years.

Attending a festival that isn’t driven by the capitalist rush of imposing the constant creation of work, a pressure that follows us everyday, highlights one of the event’s greatest qualities. The organization fosters a sense of breathing space, of truly experiencing the scene and the coexistence between artists, production, and audience. One could literally breathe in artistic creation free of obligation.

The continuous support of the technical team is remarkable, you can see the engagement and commitment so that creators and performers are able to make their imaginations a reality in the best way possible, with the taste of a premiere, such is the effort of each one involved in the scene and outside of it.

From the integration of the working group that sews the whole plot together, you can see that a second family has been embroidered by the threads of the years into the fabric that involves everyone who lives in the city and those who arrive and return for the next edition. Citemor has the characteristics of a family forged over generations of upbringing and emotional ties.

Because of the involvements recreated over the course of this journey of more than 50 years, there is a common need to look back in order to evaluate the paths taken and chosen, avoiding the risk of being seduced by the protection of mirrors and peers, which is why Citemor generously opens itself up to this outside gaze that we so carefully embrace.

In the minimalism of “Lo que baila” (What dances), Paz Rojo occupies space/time without the obligation of a limit, dreamlike sound traversed by a body that perceives itself as a transit of light directed in minimal shadows, an bodyarchive that dances. Olga Mesa’s hair denounces her intense presence, even if it isn’t the focus of any performance of her own. Her generous expressiveness is felt both inside the collective work “Ruído de Sirenas” (Noise of the Sirens), with her collaborative sketching of the choreography, and outside performing a body of work that spans the years of this festival with energy that vibrates with experience, experimentation, dialog and hope.

The effort to construct a collective expressiveness in “Jamás – Jamás” (Never – Never) (in Ruído de Sirenas), orchestrated by Francisco Ruiz de Infante, reveals a methodology that involves performance pedagogy. The academy gives in to mythologies and comes to the scene brought by the Fuera de Campo (Off the Field) research/action movement, where professor and students/interns risk composing (in) a chaotic universe of improbable materialities where masculinity, in its polarities and incongruities, manifests itself as absurd playfulness.

Citemor blooms as poetic resistance and a counterpoint to contemporary haste and the capitalist imposition of formatting, almost like a commercial franchise, in countless other festivals concerned with creating a diverse menu crammed full of productions to be devoured in a short space of time. Aside from the performance scene, the festival is interested in encounters, conversations, lunches and dinners, breaks and leisure moments, such as those spent in the salt pans, between sardines, nibbles and sips and observations on the know-how of the salt keepers. This is the seasoning of a flower that was born, grew and took root in a micro-urban landscape with bucolic features, far from the anxious spaces/times/temples of the hegemonic axes that re/produce culture to fugacity.

Plunges and perspectives:

Notes on artistic practice, risk and decolonization

In this pedagogy, we sit at the table and eat with artists, curators, producers, cultural organizers and technicians who have known each other for a long time and form a network of affective creation that makes this festival an act of resistance.

Citemor’s 50th anniversary also heralds its resilience, considering the short life of many festivals dependent on a capitalist cultural policy that values numbers, discrediting the process.

The risk of an unfinished makings

To decide is to break away and, to do so, you have to take risks. You don’t break away by being someone drinking a pitanga juice on a tropical beach (Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of Autonomy, 2021, p. 48).

As part of Acesso Cultura’s annual conference, the panel: “The risk of making mistakes, the mistake of not taking risks” (São Luiz Municipal Theatre, Lisbon, 2023), looked at mistakes as a transformative possibility through different lenses and voices of researchers and cultural professionals. Taking on error is embracing risk. Consciousness of error enables constant learning and the rupture of paradigms. To deny and/or remain in error, without consciousness, is to resist the changes that are inseparable from artistic making and from any humanity.

In Portugal, there is a relevant and plural ecosystem of artistic residencies and other contexts/formats of support for creation that must be preserved, supported, connected, amplified and disseminated. In this post-pandemic period, we are experiencing a period of undeniable creative vitality and prolixity in Portugal. Hence the importance of guaranteeing time, spaces and contexts for the various dimensions of inventive processes: questioning, investigating, experimenting, sharing. To make risks, to make better mistakes (Paulo Pires, To make better mistakes: artist residencies and support for creativity, 2023).

Paulo Pires’ assertion mirrors Citemor’s work as an example of a space-time for making mistakes. At Citemor we come into contact with artistic practices in their multiple crossroads, in a constant state of process and taking the risk of making mistakes and learning as a process. There are many works that are characterized by their procedural nature, in other words, the work is the process. According to Cecília Salles in the book Unfinished gesture: process of artistic creation, 2015, p. 157:

The networks of creation (taken as a symbolic process) that are maintained in the environment marked by unfinishedness and interactions, appear as an open system that express tendencies, such as the construction and satisfaction of a poetic project.

Thinking about error leads us to reflect on who has the right to make mistakes? There are certain professions where one mistake can tragically affect the lives of many people. We reclaim error as an open possibility that allows us to evaluate our paths and choices. To err is human. Remaining in error is a privilege. Error, when problematized, presupposes change and acceptance of risks. For Paulo Freire, the act of teaching requires risk. This risk is also assumed for the gesture of curatorship.

It is characteristic of right thinking to be willing to take risks, to accept the new which cannot be denied or accepted just because it is new, just as the rejection criteria of the old isn’t simply chronological. The old that preserves its validity or embodies a tradition or marks a presence in time remains new. The most decisive rejection of any form of discrimination is also part of right thinking. The prejudiced practice of race, class and gender offends the substantivity of the human being and radically denies democracy (Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of autonomy, 2021, p. 19).

The history of Citemor is intertwined with that of the revolution. 2024 is the year in which Portugal also celebrates 50 years of liberation from the shackles of a dictatorial regime that ravaged the country for almost as long. Looking back on a past, present, that threatens democracy through layoffs, cultural budget cuts, and censorship of artists’ freedom of expression by public institutions based on racism and authoritarianism, we understand, as Angela Davis says, that freedom is a constant struggle. With our feet on the ground, we invoke another D of a conquered and utopian Decolonization that still has a long way to go.

Orlando Patterson said that the very concept of freedom – which is considered so valuable throughout the West and has inspired so many historical revolutions in the world – must have been imagined first by enslaved people (…) I believe it is important to point to what is generally called the black radical tradition. And that this tradition is not simply related to black people, but to all peoples who struggle for freedom. (Angela Davis, Freedom is a constant struggle, 2018, p.49-64)

To think about a festival is to think about decolonization. We believe in a festival as a place of (un)certainties that acts by mirroring the world inside and out, producing utopias, symbologies and questions. We also believe in a festival capable of treading on different grounds to create concrete responses to reality. “Reality is the firm ground we walk on in our daily lives”^[1].

Reality. We all use this word routinely in very different contexts and fields of work, and yet we hardly ever stop to think about its meaning, what these seven letters contain. We don’t stop because, at first glance, the concept seems so obvious that we consider it unnecessary to question. However, according to an assertion that has become popular, the obvious is the most difficult to understand (João Francisco Duarte Júnior, What is reality, 1984, p.8).

The question of curating is almost always a question of space, of how we interact in that space, as well as the possibilities of space. In order to approach curating from an anti-racist perspective, it is thus essential to consider how to act of “decolonially” in a space, given that space is never neutral (Wessels, Niemelä & Al-Nawas, We do encourage promiscuity, but this is not a motel. Anti-racist curatorial strategies from the margins to the centre, 2018, p.86).

In “Bailar el problema” (Dancing the problem), the second piece in “Solala” trilogy, and “A outra casa da praia” works respectively by artists Amália Fernández and Anabela Almeida chosen for this year’s festival space, (auto)autobiographies expose unresolved traumas and the silenced echoes of Portuguese and Spanish colonization.

Citemor’s program reflects a strong Iberian perspective made possible through a network of affection woven over many years. The presence of these works at the festival made us think about the participation of both countries in colonization, as well as a history of denial, shame and projection of guilt on both sides. No colonization is worse or better. There is a lethargy that hinders the responsibility of confronting trauma with commitment and recognizing racism as its consequence.

We believe in the festival as an assemblage that provides encounters, utopias and dialogues, based on a lived or imagined reality, capable of transforming the present. We believe in the festival as a vector for utopias, dreams and reinventions with the consciousness that there are possible futures. “Conscientization invites us to assume a utopian position vis-à-vis the world, a position that converts the conscientized person into a ‘utopian factor’” (Paulo Freire, Awareness, 2018, p.16).

Some festivals have dedicated themselves to this utopia, destabilizing fatalism and negationism about decolonization, enabling exchanges and mutual learning through formations and thinking that don’t end in the ephemeral time of the festival. In the context of the Alkantara international festival that crosses the language of dance, theatre and performance, enabling different encounters and knowledge sharing in the city of Lisbon, post-show talks are held, generating reflections not only on the creative processes, but also on the critical analysis of the themes addressed.

Alkantara, in partnership with Polo Cultural Gaivotas, Lisbon, created PISTA, a modular learning program and forum aimed at developing and updating professional skills, sharing good practices and publicly discussing key themes and topics for the professional development of cultural agents.

In 2021, PISTA addressed aspects of decolonization in the arts through the forum on black representation in the performing arts in Portugal, moderated by Raquel Lima and featuring artists, managers and curators from the cultural sector. It’s worth mentioning that a report was produced from this forum, featuring practical proposals aligned with the pillars of the International Decade for People of African Descent (The United Nations General Assembly 2015-2024). As this year comes close to an end, it is unfortunate to note that it had little impact on the portuguese cultural sector.

In the context of the DDD Festival in Porto (2022), the generating conversation started with the relevance of a festival today, as well as the logic of its choices. Cultural programming for what and for whom? In 2023, DDD, in partnership with Alkantara, took up the discussion again, reflecting on how a festival can reinvent itself and transform cultural institutions by recognizing its mistakes and failures.

The Passagens Festival in Lisbon (2024), which brings together performance art practices and music, brought to the stage topics for discussion in open conversations about colonialism, migration, justice and reparation.

Despite treading a path based on the utopia of a radical transformation of the cultural sector through the recognition of error, failure and lack, these practices require continuity so that they can commit to concrete actions in both the short and long term.

We believe in the power of festivals as mediators of both aesthetics and ethics. We therefore challenge festivals, as society’s mirrors, to make an ethical commitment to decolonization an integral part of their strategic plans and sustainability, in dialogue with national and european guidelines that also encompass culture, such as the Porto Santo Charter (2021), promoted by the National Arts Plan, developed under the Portuguese Presidency of the Council of the European Union and the 2030 Agenda through its 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

The 2030 Agenda is a global action plan recommended by the United Nations that brings together 17 sustainable development goals aimed at promoting justice and eradicating socio-racial asymmetries. Of these goals, we highlight SDG 10: Reduce inequalities and SDG 16: Peace, justice and strong institutions.

We believe in the utopia of these two goals as a strategic plan to be embraced by festivals and cultural programmes committed to the future.

Finally, these guidelines are realised by recognising structural and institutional racism as a barrier to social justice; the equitable distribution of resources and promoting unrestricted access to culture. What humanities do we think of when we talk about sustainability? Sustainability requires taking the risk of assuming privilege and breaking down boundaries that separate and divide in order to build bridges of historic reparation.

We don’t intend to take on the responsibility of teaching how to rethink and remake European artistic practices with our gaze as creators/performers/researchers from the Global South on Iberian soil. We believe that this task does not fall to racialised people, immigrants from former colonies who have historically been instrumentalised to serve the ways of life imposed by Eurocentrism.

Colonisation, racism, xenophobia, etc. have found their amplification and commercial power in European whiteness. It is through the friction of otherness, the recognition of places of privilege, the ceding and creation of spaces for diversity, the search for information that breaks through ignorance on these issues, that the key to structural change can emerge.

Regardless of this, a revolution is already taking place in various spheres, including culture and the arts, in the day-to-day of the glaring urgencies of socio-racial inequalities, fuelled for centuries to maintain the benefits of a few.   

The lines we have written suggest, affectively, a perspective that is both broad and focussed on understanding what constitutes the term Iberian, as adopted by the festival.

The crossings to another continent, forged by Portugal and Spain, meant that these languages and traditions, through invasions, planted deep seeds of pain and joy, and countless other contradictions.

Thus, other shores also harbour a composition that is both traditional and contemporary of what it is to be Iberian and its mixtures.

We believe that Citemor, as a pioneering festival, promises to continue, after 50 years, towards other infinite contaminations, with risk and error recognised as its basis, assuming the provocation of poking at the colonial logic that unfortunately still prevails in Portuguese culture, arts, education and society.

We end this reflection with an image of the Reflexo residency taken care and curated by Xavier, fruit of dialogues that continued after the festival. This house that welcomed us with ancestral energy with which we slept, cooked tapioca and drank caipirinha. The energy of the table represents what Citemor is, a place of sharing and affection. We are also grateful for the generosity and symbolic exchanges of Cláudia Galhós, an entity in this festival, who spoke to us about her past and pointed to hopeful futures with her feet firmly planted on the ground.

Biographies:

Dori Nigro and Paulo Pinto (Brazil/Portugal) are creators, performers, art educators and researchers with academic experience at the Catholic University of Pernambuco, the Faculty of Fine Arts at the University of Porto and the College of Arts at the University of Coimbra. Partners in life and art, they create by activating themes linked to ancestry, spirituality, popular culture; affective memories; colonial heritage; dissident bodies; education, mental health and finitude. They work in pairs, in partnership with other artist friends, with groups and communities, and sometimes alone.

They are the carers of LARòyè, a house/atelier for sharing affective, creative and ancestral experiences; Tuia de Artifícios, a creative collective; Laboratório dos Sentidos, experimentation workshops stitched together by artistic practices, art/education and art therapy. Their work has been recognised by the Unique Contemporary Art Exhibition at SESC/PE; Pernambuco Arts Festival (SPA); Porto Municipal Gallery; Serralves Museum of Contemporary Art; Cerveira Biennial Museum; Porto Photography Biennial; Paulo Cunha e Silva Campus; Trema Festival; Dance Days Festival – DDD; Shuttle programme, Artistic Internationalisation; DGARtes – Portuguese Directorate General for the Arts. His latest creations in partnership are: Alva Escura; PIN DOR AMA, Primeira Lição; Vento (A)Mar; Serei/Afrodiaspórica. Lately they have been working on the projects SALVALAVALMA and Tá Pió Cá, Lição de Raíz. 

IG: @dorinigro / @paulo.emilio.pinto

Image credits:

Photos 1, 2, 3 & 6 by Paulo Pinto
Photo 4 by Dori Nigro
Photo 5 & 7 by Xavier de Sousa
Photo 8 by Daniel Pinheiro

References:
Davis, A. (2018). A liberdade é uma luta constante (Freedom is a constant struggle). Boitempo Editorial.
Duarte Júnior, J. F. (1984). O que é a realidade. (What is reality). Brasiliense Editora.
Freire, P. (2018). Conscientização (Awareness). Cortez Editora.
Freire, P. (2021). Pedagogia da autonomia (Pedagogy of autonomy). Paz e Terra Editora.
Paulo Pires (2023), Para errar melhor: residências artísticas e apoio à criatividade, (to make better mistakes: artist residencies and support for creativity) in Comunidade Cultura e Arte.
Salles, C. A. (1998). Gesto inacabado: processo de criação artística. (Unfinished gesture: process of artistic creation). Annablume.
Wessels, C., Niemelä M., & Al-Nawas, A. (2018). We do encourage promiscuity, but this is not a motel. Anti-racist curatorial strategies from the margins to the centre. In Bayer, N., Kazeem-Kaminski, B., & Sternfeld, N. (Eds.). Curating as anti-racist practice. ​​Aalto University, School of Arts, Design and Architecture.

---

^[1]  (Duarte Júnior, What is reality, 1984, p.8)