LANDSCAPES: THE PRESENCE OF THE RELIGIOUS
May 18 to July 30, 2016
The title of the exhibition was formulated from the perspective of relating the nature of the collection of the Sacred Art Museum of Funchal with the general theme of the International Museum Day, "Cultural Landscapes", launched by ICOM as a theme for reflection by the international museum community in 2016, foreseeing scrutiny of the dynamics between the geographical territories and the communities established in the various places.

Aware that an approach to the collections of sacred art always implies a recollection of the experiential contexts of each community, around the images and the sacred, the museum made its approach specific, through the inquiry of the role of the religious in the geographical perception and cultural construction of the island territory. The humanization of the landscape that, over the centuries, was made by material and cultural investment in the modelling of spaces and life forms, integrated in this process the active dimension of the language of belief and traditions, allowing us today to perceive the contamination of the cultural by the religious and the inescapable role of the Christian faith, in its aspect of popular religiosity, in the deeper construction – heritage, experiences, memory – of insular identity.

Beginning with the artistic and symbolic identity that configures the Sacred Art Museum of Funchal, the exhibition proposed a meeting for dialogue between pieces of sacred art from the past (liturgical objects such as incense boat, monstrances, processional lanterns, processional cross, pallium, stole, alb, surplice, sedan chair, among others), the documentary archive of the museum (photographs of the building, museography and objects over the decades) and the exterior (photographic documentary background of photographer José de Sousa Monteiro, images of the 50s/60s of the twentieth century) with the artistic production of regional creators, in areas such as drawing and painting, analogue and digital, sculpture, photography and video. With one foot in contemporaneity, the exhibition strategy adopted created another museological perception, a new visuality of the elements, an anthropological reconfiguration of the landscape.

The exhibition was set up in two interconnected spaces. The first, larger, grouping was exhibited in the Temporary Exhibition Hall and the second one, smaller, was placed in the rooms of the Belvedere Tower of the museum, where some photographic books and films/documentaries that focused on the Sacred Art Museum and its relationship with the cultural landscape were displayed. The following activity was associated with this exhibition: Landscape: a kaleidoscopic concept. A visit oriented to the temporary exhibition, in connection with the collection of Flemish art, aimed at addressing the relationship between culture and landscape, and ancient and contemporary art.

Guest Artists: Sandra Boloto, Sílvio Cró, Juan Abreu, Tiago Perestrelo, Joana Sousa, Patrícia Henriques, Pedro Freitas, Lucilina Freitas, José de Sousa Monteiro, Flávio Nuno Joaquim, Carmem, Martinho Mendes, Hélder Folgado, David Francisco, João Almeida