João Mourão, director of the Arquipélago – Contemporary Arts Centre, Portugal. Photo © Álvaro Miranda
What is your museum about and what is your work there?
Arquipélago – Centro de Artes Contemporâneas is the contemporary art center of the Portuguese Autonomous Region of the Azores, an archipelago of nine islands located in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, between Europe and the North American continent.
It was created by the Regional Government in 2015, as a place for the production, presentation, and fruition of contemporary art in all its multiple languages: from visual arts to theatre, from performance to dance, and from architecture to cinema. Focusing on the local community, it aims at being both national and international.
The museum occupies the premises of a former alcohol factory with a total area of more than 10.000 square meters, which was impeccably projected by architects João Mendes Ribeiro and Menos é Mais. It has spaces for artist residencies, a black box for performative arts, music, and cinema, exhibition spaces, and a plethora of multipurpose spaces.
