Substances

Substances | Armazém Fundo / Térmita – Largo de Mompilher 5, Porto – 5th July to 2nd August – 2 p.m. to 8 p.m.

Group exhibition with works by students from the FAI, VAP and VAM courses – Inês Rocha, Regina Lobo, Constança Guedes, Matias Vieira Sousa, Sara Lino Mota, Diogo Brilha. Organised by Nuno Ramalho and Pedro Huet. Commissioned by Miguel Seabra.

In this exhibition, elements of nature are not treated as autonomous entities or separate from human beings. They are seen in their ongoing relationship with the formation of human nature — influencing behaviours, perceptions, and modes of existence. Instead of distant or “representative” objects, they appear as integral parts of what constitutes us, active forces in the construction of human nature itself. Instead of observing them from a distance, we recognise their constant presence in the ways in which we inhabit the world, relate to time, to the body, and to others, to ourselves.

The works gathered propose a reading in which nature and humanity are not opposed, but coexist in layers of interdependence. And yet, each proposal is not limited to the citation of “the natural,” nor does it reduce it to an easier material complacency. Each artistic gesture explores this connection of “reconnection”: be it through matter, movement, memory, or landscape. The aim is not to represent nature as a backdrop or prop, but to highlight how it shapes human experience — and how it, in turn, is also transformed by it.

In a time marked by ecological urgencies (and sometimes easy artistic concessions) and by the rethinking of the boundaries between the human and the non-human, the works on display make this continuous mutual shaping visible. What is at stake is not just observing nature, but recognising ourselves in it, not as a compacted and typified whole, but as parts in perpetual movement.