Page 4 - as margens dos mares

Movements of the Past and of the Present

Are areas of land embedded on the coasts of Europe, America, and Africa, separated
by the ocean, or, rather, connected by it?
Movements of the past, which in their wake left Portuguese-speaking populations
in mutually distant territories, suggest that the vast waters that separate cultures
can also bring them together. This is because the crossings of the Atlantic led not
only to the discovery of new lands but also to encounters among peoples. Thus,
despite and because of the tensions and other consequences involved in this process,
the overseas adventure led to intense interchange and produced cultural syntheses.
Hundreds of years later, renewed dialogues between countries that share Portuguese
as a heritage of those times are now blossoming in infinite possibilities. While a shared
language makes conversation easier, multiple and diverse experiences in the field
of nonverbal languages, such as the visual arts and music, are giving rise to feelings,
posing questions, and daring to formulate always transient responses.
The blurring of the rigid outlines that once set boundaries between the languages
of art has expanded the paths available to artistic creators. Images, sounds, touches,
smells, and tastes are today mixed in synesthetic compositions that foster reflections
on contemporary issues.
This profusion of sensible experiences constitutes the main line of the project As
Margens dos Mares [The Margins of the Seas]. By bringing together musicians and
visual artists from Angola, Brazil, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique, and
Portugal, Sesc encourages cultural exchanges and encounters in a movement of the
present, which, it is hoped, will spawn new developments in its wake.

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Danilo Santos de Miranda
Regional Director of Sesc São Paulo

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