Wonderland Lisboa

Today is a day to enjoy Lisbon. We are fortunate to be within easy walking distance of shopping, museums, and parks. We plan to run some errands, see a couple of museum shows, and take in the holiday decorations all around the city.

Our walk takes us through the park at Campo Grande (Jardim Mário Soares), and then past the pedestrian mall near the bull ring at Campo Pequeno. Hang a right, a few more blocks, and we arrive at the Gulbenkian Museum. They are marking the fiftieth anniversary of the Museum building with a retrospective installation called Art on Display. The idea is to revisit some of the unique ideas used during the the early years of the Museum to exhibit sculptures and painting.

Approaching the Museum's entrance, there is a temporary concrete block pavilion with spaces for sculpture. That construction is repeated inside the main gallery, which is on the same level as the pavilion outside, so you can see the one from the other. To display paintings, and address the relationship between the artwork and the gallery space, there are several methods deployed. In one small area, the art is free-standing on easel-like stands. In an adjoining larger space, the paintings are stood or suspended on thin metal rods. so they can be free-standing or just off the wall. One rig includes a handle, but it is not clear exactly what that does (it does not allow any vertical adjust, and appears only to allow the viewer to see the back of the frame).

Past the concrete block wall, there are a series of angled walls with some quite large, abstract paintings. The Museum has left the backs of these walls unfinished, but the finished sides are all smooth and white, and very brightly lit, so a cleaner feel than the building's actual walls.

On the other side of the white walls is a space filled with smaller, framed paintings on vertical glass panels. This is quite striking, as the space is evenly filled with art; that is, the art is not around the perimeter but throughout the space. All the images face the same direction, creating a variety of paths for visitors. Interestingly, many viewers spend as much time looking at the backs than the fronts. Seeing the architecture, the other pieces, and the other viewers through the glass makes for some interesting juxtapositions. The paintings do all seem to belong there, so these display methods seem to limit the types of art pieces that can be shown.

 

 

In the lower gallery is a show featuring political posters, Robin Fior: Call to Action, which reminds me very much of the show we assembled at OMCA (posters can be viewed on the collection site that I helped build). In keeping with the Display show, the posters and other ephemera are displayed on vertical glass panels, as well as in tray tables laid on ceramic blocks. The show includes some wonderful graphics, and powerful images, including some that play with the glass (such as the open hand, and the transparent urban figure-ground).

 

 

 

 

As the sun begins to set, we head over to the Parque Eduardo VII, where the city has put together a "Wonderland Lisboa". We arrive at the top of the long stretch of boxwood mazes, and can see the Wonderland begins about halfway down. There is some loud live music and a long line snaking in front of an elevated ice rink (the view from the rink must be wonderful). As we reach the first of the vendor stalls, we can look across and see a kind of Santa's Village laid out in from of the Ritz. Beyond the ice rink, there is a large, transparent, arched cover for the stage, and behind that is a ferris wheel trimmed in pink lights. Between the rink and the wheel, there is a bit of open lawn, with some pyramidal wood frames decorated with garland and light strings, and there are a few other smaller rides.

The live music might be there to entertain the families in queue to skate, but they are waiting on the other side of rink (the line does seem to move in quick little waves). Santa's Village is also well attended, though there doesn't seem to be much going on; there are a lot of little buildings, but nothing at all inside them. Santa must be in the village somewhere, but we can't see him.

The whole carnival seems strangely out of place to my foreign eyes, but the other visitors seem to be having a a lot of fun. "A magia de Natal para toda la família".