THE CARNIVAL IS A STAGE, THE ISLAND A FEAST


2012 - 2013

(video | HD video, 1h 32' 35'', 16:9, colour, sound)

Video to be projected in a double-image system, with images shown side by side. This is a solution I often use in my practice. By choosing to show two images at the same time, I try to achieve different combinations of meaning, going beyond the simple addition of the images (where image A + image B are not equal to the meaning AB, but rather producing something new, AB + C).

This is a video art piece that follows an anthropological process with a documentary approach to a unique and very little known cultural phenomenon – the Terceira Island Carnival dances – where the islanders come together once a year and everyone becomes an actor or an actress to reenact the old dances and ancient Morality plays, using contemporary folklore including colourful glittering stage dresses and extravagant hairdos.

All this happens in rural meeting halls having full house, while the action is live-streamed on the internet. People dance to rock, pop or kuduro music, with the only difference it is performed with cavaquinho, accordion and tambourine. Farmers become actors, fishermen become drag artists, clergymen sing amusing irreverent songs, the island’s most highly regarded playwright is a taxi-driver and everyone plays a part, onstage or offstage, among cheerful applause, laughs, communion, satire, music, tables loaded with food, rockets outside, cows and bull-impersonations.




As a film – my first film – it was presented at the Portuguese Cinematheque - Museum of Cinema (2013) and it was nominee to the category of Best Documentary in QueerLisboa Cinema Festival (2013).