ANA NOLASCO
Title of the project: Innovation, art and design: emerging creative archipelagos; the influences in contemporary creative processes among Lusophone Macaronesian islands, Africa and Portugal
Scholarship reference: SFRH/BPD/10839/2015
Start and end date: September, 2016 – September, 2019
Description
This project aims to promote a reflection on the intersection between handicraft, design and art productions in the Portuguese speaking islands of the Atlantic, in the context of globalization and increasing transnational mobility. Attention will also be given to new mainland cultural constellations resulting from these artistic migrations. The islands’ openness to the sea, as well as their concomitant isolation characterize its oxymoron: the topos of excellence of the mainlander’s imaginary is the islanders’ homeland – metaphor for isolation for some, communication platform for others. Globalization, and the resulting erosion of local cultures, has led to the emergence of alternative views opposed to this western hegemony, through the exaltation of local know-how and vanishing life-styles. In this context, trough conferences, interviews and publication of essays, this project aims to problematize in what measure can islands constitute creative laboratories of subversive movements reinstating what is known as traditional expertise.