Jorge Santos

the world appeared to her reflected by pure inwardness
Jorge Santos
Good fences make good neighbors
Robert Frost
There is a line, a border, which separates us from our neighbors. Be that in the form of a fence, a
gate or a simple door, it establishes an irresolvable tension between demarcation and common
space, between private and public. It conveys a sense of security and comfort but at the same time
of division. A line that, in the American poet’s vision, makes whoever is on the other side (and
ourselves as well), and exactly because they are on that other side, good neighbors. This invisible limit,
taking on different appearances, is a central element in the exhibition (and in the artist’s thinking).
It materializes as a brick wall or as a couple of closed gates. In keeping with the metaphor of the
apparently familiarity, Jorge Santos’ work is traversed by a (suspicious) simplicity, which translates
in the economy of colors and forms used and even in the number of exhibited works. There is
almost a feeling of emptiness woven through each work placing them in the verge of disappearance.
Santos chooses ordinary things to inspire his work, and much of what is presented originates precisely from
his wanderings around Spike. In a complex and sophisticated world, we often loose sight of its inherent
simplicity. By creating pieces infused by a sort of a ghostly romantic minimalism, the artist embodies Proust’s
famous concept of mémoire involontaire. Developed in his novel In Search of Lost Time, particularly in the
famous ‘madeleine episode’, the author describes the way in which memories of the past flood the present
by the simple tasting a particular cake. An analogous effect is sought through the works of Jorge Santos.
Located in the geography of the everyday, they act as cues to recollect the past without a conscious effort.
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Their simplicity is nevertheless misleading as they create a violent but subtle fissure, which displaces
the viewer by destabilizing the familiar. Through the use of repetition, Jorge Santos’ work locates itself
between boredom and confusion, order and chaos and thus disturbs the smooth surface of daily existence.
A further theme permeates this artist’s work: domesticity. The house, epitomizing an uncanny
synonym for inwardness, becomes a metaphor for the duality interior/exterior. Santos acts both
on both sides of this fold. On the one hand, an unapproachable exterior symbolized through
the closed gates, the sharp threatening fences, and by an imprisoning wall. And on the other, by a
mutating wallpaper which encapsulates the idea of an incarcerating interior (and which evokes
the 19th century short tale The Yellow Wallpaper by American writer Charlotte Perkins Gilman).
Nature is woven through most of the works. If at first glance it resembles a melancholic
romantic
gesture,
at
close
inspection
it
acquires
an
aggressiveness
resulting
from
a
sort of a silent but brutal infiltration within the most basic structures of daily life.
The presented works establish themselves within a language that Santos has been developing
for the past years, in which, transparency, reflection, light and space are key pillars.
Filipa Oliveira
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List of Works
Winter landscape #4, 2006 (p.4)
Lambda print
100 x 70 cm
Untitled, 2009 (p.5)
Lambda print
100 x 70 cm
Tragaluz #1, 2005 (p.6)
Mirrored black acrylic
Variable dimensions
Tragaluz #3, 2007 (p.7)
Mirrored black acrylic
Variable dimensions
View Point #2, 2009 (p.8-11)
Plaster, wood and paint
Variable dimensions
photograph by Stuart Bunce
Blind wall, 2010 (p.12-14)
Plaster, cement, paint
200 x 800 cm
Untitled, 2010 (p.15)
white paint on paper
144 x 200 cm
photograph by Nada com Nada
Blind Gate #1, 2010 (p.16)
Embossed print on paper
275 x 260 cm
photograph by Nada com Nada
Blind Gate #2, 2010 (p.17)
Embossed print on paper
275 x 260 cm
photograph by Nada com Nada
research material, 2009 (p.18-19)
Spring Cage, 2010 (p.20-27)
Video, color, no sound, 8’, loop
Template for embossed print (p. 28)
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Jorge Santos
Silves, 1974. Lives and works in Lisbon.
Concluded is degree in Plastic Arts at E.S.T.G.A.D., Caldas da Rainha, Portugal, in 2001.
Participated in Project Room at Centro Cultural de Belém, 2001, and was an assistant of Pedro Cabrita Reis between 2001 and 2002.
Colaborator for Galeria ZDB, Lisbon, in 2003.
Received an artistic development fellowship from the Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian between 2005 e 2006, for a residence in Casa de
Velázquez, Madrid.
In 2007, presented the project Running Window at the Museu Colecção Berardo in Lisbon.
Received an artistic development fellowship from the Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian Uk Branch, in 2009, for a residence Spike Island,
Bristol.
Solo Shows
2010 Rapture, Drawing, Fragments of love songs, sculptoric installation, Love poem #1, Zoom, Gallery Carlos Carvalho, Lisbon
2009 View point #2, sculptoric site-specific installation, Test one, Spike Island, Bristol
2008 Nocturne, drawing, Shadow stream series and photography, winter landscape and Breached projection, Galeria Espacio Liquido, Gijòn
Shadow Stream, video installation Quad-Water skylight, drawings Shadow Stream series, Galeria 111, Lisbon
Autumn House, slide show installation, Cooperativa de Arte e Cultura, Torres Vedras
2007 Running Window, video installation, Museu Coleção Berardo, Lisbon
Taller Revisitado, Casa de Velázquez, Madrid
2006 Retiro, sculptoric installation, Tragaluz #2, drawing series, Reflexo, Galeria 24b, Oeiras
O Navio, video in la cámara obscura, Casa de América
Eternal love, sculptoric site-specific installation, project Taller Ocupado, Casa de Velázquez
View Point, sculptoric site-specific installation, project Taller Ocupado, Casa de Velázquez, Madrid
2005 Tragaluz, sculptoric site-specific installation, project Taller Ocupado, Casa de Velázquez, Madrid
Tired of living for the city, video projection, photography, Bomba Suícida, Lisbon.
2004 Genérico para uma Tela de Cinema, video installation, Cinemateca Portuguesa, Lisbon
2003 Now the night is closing in, video installation, Graça Brandão gallery, Lisbon
2001 Night Shadow, video installation, Art Attack, Caldas da Rainha
Group Shows
2010 Personal Dj, Museu da República, Galeria Lago, Rio de Janeiro, Brasil
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2009 Uma mesa e três cadeiras, Edificio ETIC, Lisbon
2008 Á volta do papel, 100 artistas, CAMB, Lisbon
Explum Puerto Lumbreras
Muestra de video ibero americana, La nave, Sevile
2007 Breached projection, photographic installation, Private office, Espaço Avenida, Lisbon
Signos de la cuidad, Centro Andaluz de Arte Contemporânea, Sevile; Centro de Cultura Antiguo Instituto de Gijón, Gijón
2006 The acts of apparition, Plataforma Revólver, Lisbon
Arco 2007, Galeria 24b, Madrid
Arte Lisbon, Galeria 24b, Lisbon
2005 Running River, drawings, Verão asul, Escola das Artes, Lagoa
Arco 2006, Galeria Moriarty, Madrid
2004 Autumn house, slide installation, Arte Contempo, Lisbon
Genérico para uma tela de cinema, poster, Ho dear! Galeria Zdb, Lisbon
Loja do Lopes, photography, Armazém 7, Lisbon
2003 Estore projectado, video installation, Catalyst Arts, Belfast
Envelopes #3, photographic installation, Showindows project, Experimentadesign2003, Lisbon
2002 Film Noir, video installation site-specific in an apartment, Lisbon.
Varanda com vista sobre uma varanda, video installation site-specific in an apartment, Lisbon
2001 Sombra, photographic installation, Galeria D.Ivone, Armazém 7, Lisbon
As time goes by, site-specific installation, Um passo na floresta, Lisbon
2000 Rendez-vous, video installation, Cortina, instalação, Galeria 30 dias, Caldas da Rainha
S/ título, slide projection, Galeria D. Ivone, Lisbon
Árvore, photographic installation, Galeria D. Ivone, Caldas da Rainha
1999 Envelopes #1 e Envelopes #2 , site-specific installation at the E.S.A.D. amphitheatre, Caldas da Rainha
1998 Summertime, installation, Produções 1871, Lisbon
S/ título, installation in an apartment, Caldas da Rainha
Agência de viagens Landscape, Piso 2, Caldas da Rainha
I’m a tourist, installation, Produções 1871, Lisbon
Collections
Collection Pedro Cabrita Reis, Foundation PLMJ, Madeira Corporate Services Collection, Centro de Arte Manuel de Brito Collection
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A very special thank you to Spike Island, particularly to Marie-Anne MacQuay
and David Martin, who made the exhibition possible. Another special
acknowledgment to the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation in London for their
extraordinary support, specially to Sian Ede and Isabel Lucena.
Other individuals and institutions who deserve my appreciation and gratefulness:
Ana João Romana, Ana Sacramento, Carolina Vasconcelos, Charlotte
Hetherington, Diana Ferreira, Dominik Sieger, Escola Secundária Fernando
Namora, Escola Superior de Arte e Design, Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian
Lisbon, Gill Hedley, Helena Madureira, Juan Delgado, Juan-Janón Barbancho,
Manuel Costa Cabral, Max Rosenheim, Mónica Amaral, Nemia Maclachlan,
Paulo Inácio, Pedro Marcelo, Rita Fabiana, Rod Harris, Rui Marianito, Tom
Ketteringham, Vera Gonçalves.
This 250 limited edition book was printed at Textype (Portugal) and the covers
hand-printed by the artists, made for the exhibition the world appeared to her
reflected by pure inwardness at Spike Island, 17 July – 12 September 2010.