The Museum of Anthropology is to premiere a new exhibit, Heaven, Hell & Somewhere In Between, beginning May 12. It is a compilation of Portuguese folk and popular artwork expressing the passion of the Portuguese people for social, political and religious experiences. The exhibition aims to capture the playful, subversive culture of the Portuguese nation through urban graffiti projections, mural creations and masks depicting Portuguese politicians, football club managers and celebrities.
Curator and director of MOA Anthony Shelton has been a central part of the exhibition since its inception in 2011. Following his acceptance into the Portuguese community of Vancouver, Shelton began research into the underrepresented embodiments of Portuguese folk art in Canada.
“We set ourselves the task that five or six of the artists included in the collection at MOA had to be original, that they had never shown their art in public before,” Shelton said. “What I found when I started visiting folk artists was that there are very few of them. It’s a dying art, it’s not being passed on.”
The range and variety within the folk art community is represented fully in the exhibit at MOA. Shelton spent an entire year doing research by speaking to the artists within their own communities.
“We call it popular art in the exhibition, because ‘folk art’ gives a suggestion of the rural, but we’ve included graffiti and murals as well, which we’ll be projecting on the walls,” said Shelton. “The question became ‘what do we mean by popular art?’ Anthropology museums don’t really collect it, and art history museums don’t collect it or deal with it very well, so it sort of falls between the boundaries of different subjects.”
There is an emphasis on an industrial aesthetic within Heaven, Hell & Somewhere In Between.
“We didn’t want it to be an art exhibition or too aestheticised, and we didn’t want it to be an ethnographic exhibition,” said Shelton. “We wanted to have some kind of industrial feel to it, it’s about decay and time.”
This became the starting point for the overarching theme of the exhibit hall. The room is divided into three sections -- heaven, hell, and the in-between -- all through representations of Portugal at its different stages in recent history, from dictatorship to the recession. Throughout the winter season, sheets of 12x10 foot iron were stationed outside to rust, and were then sealed to protect the artwork it will be supporting. The inspiration for this came from photos and tales of Portuguese cod fishing fleets.
The rusted sheets are juxtaposed with undyed natural cotton, creating an aesthetic which works with each piece in the exhibition.
“I don’t know what rust does to light, but it must be something incredible,” said Shelton on the exhibition. “It took a long time to figure out, but essentially, it’s a really theatrical exhibition.”
Striving to stray from stereotypical images of heaven and hell, Shelton expanded upon the use of projections in the exhibition.
“We’re working on a projection of the stock exchange board in 2009, when all the share prices for Portuguese companies started to decrease. One whole wall will be this, with masked devils floating in front of it,” he said.
There are a minute quantity of differences between “folk art” and “popular art.” Heaven, Hell & Somewhere In-Between places strong emphasis on the impact of the Portuguese community in the creation of the art.
“Popular art is community art,” said Shelton. “Generally it’s made by an individual and mediated by the community so it is affected by and interacts with the wider world.”
The exhibit is filled with images of devils, saints and contemporary celebrities or famous figures. It looks to be a hugely varied exhibition, and the theatrical aspects highlighted by Shelton are sure to create an impact upon the community here in Vancouver. For the second year running, MOA is organizing a cultural tour to Portugal for two weeks in October, shortly before the exhibit closes. The aim of the trip is to fully engage with the art of the exhibition, meeting the artists and seeing their communities.
“You can go as deep into the exhibition as you want,” said Shelton. “It’s more of a living museum, a doorway into different cultures and different ways of life rather than a static exhibition.”
The exhibition is a mixture of all kinds of art, from traditional to modern, and promises to be a theatrical, dramatic display.
“The material is everything,” said Shelton. “It’s masks, masquerade costumes, pottery… I want to change Canadian perceptions about Europe.”
Heaven, Hell & Somewhere In Between is displayed at MOA from May 12 - October 12.