SOUND MEMORY OF CORK IN SANTA MARIA DA FEIRA
Multichannel sound and video installation
by Luís Gomes da Costa
Museum of Santa Maria de Lamas (Santa Maria da Feira, Portugal)
16 January – 23 May 2015 (09h30-12h30 – 14h00-17h00)
A co-production of Binaural/Nodar, Museum of Santa Maria de Lmas, Municipality of Santa Maria da Feira and Santa Maria da Feira Youth Orchestra and Symphonic Band
After its premiere in late 2014 at the House of Culture of Lourosa, the work SOUND MEMORY OF CORK IN SANTA MARIA DA FEIRA is exhibited in an emblematic museum space of the region, the extraordinary Museum of Lamas, founded in the 50s of the last century by the meritorious Commendatore Henrique Alves de Amorim and that assembles a rich set of pieces of varied nature and origin: Portuguese sacred art, painted tiles, painting and sculpture, natural sciences and of course cork in many of its aspects: www.museudelamas.pt/
In the municipality of Santa Maria da Feira (Aveiro district, Portugal) there is a both unlikely and magnificent industrial history: the cork industry: In little more than 50 years a poor rural area has become the epicenter of the global production of cork stoppers and other cork derivatives, creating an ecosystem of hundreds of companies that endures today with increasing vigor. We can look at this story from a purely business perspective, but what stands out is also the story of generations of men and women, mostly simple people, who, with a unique resilience, learned to convey the legacy of an artisanal craft towards new ways to produce, innovate and commercialize. In short, Santa Maria da Feira is a rare case in several connections: the deep and daily connection between memory and future, the connection between entrepreneurship and working class and the connection between a sustainable use of natural resources and industry.
Sound Memory of Cork is a multichannel sound and video installation by Luis Gomes da Costa (coordinator of Binaural/Nodar) that was based on a multidisciplinary fieldwork : analysis of historical documents, sound recordings made in cork factories along with over 50 students from the local school community and interviews with relevant industry actors (current and former workers, entrepreneurs, industry leaders and local museum directors). The visitors at Casa da Cultura de Lourosa will witness an immersive environment that honors in innovative ways the history of the Cork industry, that is particularly aimed at children and young people from the area, so that they can deepen their knowledge and sense of identity in relation to a industry which in many instances connects several generations of their own families.
Luís Gomes da Costa’s biography:
Luis Gomes da Costa (1968). President of Binaural/Nodar (São Pedro do Sul, Portugal). Curator, programmer, organizer and sound and video documentarist. Since 2006 he has developed documentation and educative sound and video projects in the mountain ranges of Gralheira, Arada and Montemuro. Coordinator of Nodar Rural Art Lab, a space for multimedia artistic research in the rural village of Nodar, where more than a hundred artists and researchers were already hosted. He coordinates the Memory Archive of Dão-Lafões and Paiva, a multimedia research, cataloging and mapping project of the collective memory of territories from the districts of Viseu and Aveiro. He directed the sound/video experimental documentary ” Where is the Source of my Paiva? “, premiered in 2011 during Paivascapes #1 Festival. As a sound artist, he released in 2011 at Edições Nodar, with English sound artist Jez riley French , the CD ” Sonata for Clarinet and Nodar” and in 2014 the book+CD “São Pedro do Sul: New Rural Listenings”. In 2011 he co-edited the catalogue and double CD ” Three Years in Nodar – Context -Specific Artistic Practices in Rural Portugal”, in late 2012 he published a book of essays and interviews, “Living an Ancient World: Texts on Art and Territories (2012 -2008)” and in 2014 he co-edited an essay book+DVD on the works of Manuela Barile: “The Sense of Pain: Two works by Manuela Barile” (co-released with Italian label La Parete della Caverna).