Listening to the Land
Every sculpture park begins long before the first sculpture.
This one begins with listening.
This one begins with listening.
WHAT THE LAND REMEMBERED
A land art project about memory, family and the quiet archaeology of everyday life.
How should a sculpture park begin?
Not with a sculpture.
But with listening.
But with listening.
| BEFORE THE BIG IDEA For many years I have dreamed of creating a sculpture park. I always imagined it would begin with an artwork. Instead, it began with a question. How should a sculpture park begin? After marrying into a Portuguese family, I found myself spending more and more time in northern Portugal. Not the Portugal of postcards. But the Portugal where my husband's parents, brothers, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins and neighbors have lived for generations. This project began while learning to understand that landscape. |
A DIFFERENT WAY OF LIVING
- Today we live in Dubai.
Like many people there, we live between countries, languages and cultures.
Perhaps because of that, places with deep roots have become even more meaningful to us. - Returning to northern Portugal reminds us that identity is not only something we carry inside ourselves.
It also lives in landscapes.
In gardens.
In family rituals.
In the objects that quietly survive from one generation to the next.
This project is not about nostalgia.
It is about understanding how places shape who we are.
What fascinated me most was not a single object, but an entire way of living.
Here, houses seem to grow from the hills instead of dominating them.
Old and contemporary architecture coexist naturally.
Gardens are cultivated with care.
Fruit trees are planted for future generations.
Everyday life itself becomes a form of culture.
Not museum culture.
Living culture.
Gardens are cultivated with care.
Fruit trees are planted for future generations.
Everyday life itself becomes a form of culture.
Not museum culture.
Living culture.
TWO PIECES OF LAND
This project unfolds across two neighboring family properties.
The first belonged to my husband's grandparents.
Today it is home to chickens, fruit trees and vegetable gardens.
It is not designed to be beautiful.
It was built to support everyday life.
And perhaps that is exactly what makes it beautiful.
The second property is where my husband's parents have lived for several decades.
This year we began clearing the garden, the laundry room and several storage spaces.
That was the moment the project truly began.
Today it is home to chickens, fruit trees and vegetable gardens.
It is not designed to be beautiful.
It was built to support everyday life.
And perhaps that is exactly what makes it beautiful.
The second property is where my husband's parents have lived for several decades.
This year we began clearing the garden, the laundry room and several storage spaces.
That was the moment the project truly began.
THE FINDS
Broken roof tiles.
Ceramic fragments.
Old cooking pots.
Glass bottles.
Metal tools.
Granite stones.
Pieces of everyday life.
None of them belong in a museum.
None are valuable on their own.
Yet together they form an archive of ordinary existence.
Many survived not because they were precious, but because nobody ever felt the need to throw them away.
That became the starting point of this work.
Ceramic fragments.
Old cooking pots.
Glass bottles.
Metal tools.
Granite stones.
Pieces of everyday life.
None of them belong in a museum.
None are valuable on their own.
Yet together they form an archive of ordinary existence.
Many survived not because they were precious, but because nobody ever felt the need to throw them away.
That became the starting point of this work.
THE CHICKEN YARD
One of the most important places in this project is also the most ordinary.
The old chicken yard.
It is still alive.
Chickens wander between stones, roof tiles, forgotten tools and traces of many decades of daily life.
Nothing here was composed as art.
Everything accumulated naturally through living.
For me, this place became an unexpected archive.
It reminds us that culture does not only exist in museums.
Sometimes it exists in the way people build a chicken house, repair a fence, grow vegetables or keep objects whose value lies only in the memories they carry.
The old chicken yard.
It is still alive.
Chickens wander between stones, roof tiles, forgotten tools and traces of many decades of daily life.
Nothing here was composed as art.
Everything accumulated naturally through living.
For me, this place became an unexpected archive.
It reminds us that culture does not only exist in museums.
Sometimes it exists in the way people build a chicken house, repair a fence, grow vegetables or keep objects whose value lies only in the memories they carry.