Linhas de Bordadura, Francisca Dores

In this work, the result of an artistic residency at Solar, Francisca Dores offers a critical view of agricultural monoculture: she describes fields fragmented by lines, disappearing horizons, subsoils contaminated by chemicals — ‘poisons that penetrate the soil,’ as she herself describes it.

The artist combines repetitive photographic images with industrial gestures, creating a landscape that oscillates between the microscopic and the cosmic. In doing so, she proposes a reflection on the artificialisation of nature, the sterility of genetically modified seeds and the alienation of an environment transformed by the logic of productivity.

entre o meio-dia e as três, Sara Graça

As part of her residency at Solar, Sara Graça explores large-format photography and the horizon as a cinematic motif. The artist worked for five days with teenagers from Vila do Conde and surrounding areas, using workshops and multidisciplinary exercises. The horizon — an emblem of anticipation — provided the visual foundation. After initial filming in Vila do Conde, Graça continued the project on Carcavelos beach, filming three pairs of youths who answered street posters.

On display is an installation that combines a film shot on Carcavelos beach with photographs taken on Vila do Conde beach.

Post-Summer Laboratories 2025

Solar will showcase the collective exhibition Post-Summer Laboratories 2025. This exhibition, the outcome of the 11th Summer Laboratories, is made in partnership with gnration (Braga) and CIAJG – José de Guimarães International Arts Centre.

It features projects by four artists — Catarina Braga, Dora Vieira, Renato Cruz Santos, and Mariana Sardon — who developed their work during an artistic residence, curated by Joana Pestana:

• Catarina Braga presents In Search of the Forgotten Image, a video essay that reflects on the plant-image (an emoji) and its ontological quest, questioning technological mediation in the relationship between nature and image;

• Dora Vieira presents an immersive installation called Homunculus, which uses sculpture, painting, video, and sound to explore the materiality of the body in the post-human context;

• Renato Cruz Santos exhibits Stone of Memory, an audiovisual installation that dialogues with the identity of the Caxinas community (Vila do Conde), between the sea, urbanisation and symbolic past;

• Mariana Sardon, shows Electromagnetic Botany, made up of interconnected sound devices that evoke natural and synthetic compounds in an ever-changing soundscape.
  

  
  

The exhibition highlights the diversity of approaches taken by the artists and invites visitors to draw ‘lines of convergence’ between biological and technological systems, between the human and the non-human, revealing an experimental and investigative stance.


With these three exhibitions — one collective and two individual — Solar reinforces its role as a space for artistic and cinematic experimentation, promoting residencies, research, and dialogue between contemporary art and current social, environmental, and identity concerns.