1. If you were to formulate your current work into questions, what could they be?

Could my work be replaced by broader questions from sociology or social, cultural, and linguistic anthropology, as well as by generic existential and philosophical questions?

2. What are some points of tension driving your investigation today? (e.g., empirical, social, political, environmental)

Of the thousand occupations I could have chosen, deciding to pursue an artistic career in the current context is the first point of tension fueling my investigation. The early need to question everything, coupled with resistance to accepting social dogmas or rules imposed by existing systems (starting in the family and school environment), led to me being "asked to leave" catechesis when I was about 6 or 7 years old. The same resistance and need, but somewhat more evolved, are what drive me today to address various political or social issues, such as job precariousness, social inequalities, and other existential and philosophical matters. Although not explicitly part of my work's discourse, which is the result of chance, necessity, but also my daily life, environmental concern is inherent in my practice, as I strive to use natural or recycled materials.

3. ENVIRONMENT - If we were to depict an Open-Studio, what does the general environment in your studio look like? - What are your main mediums (technical and/or conceptual)

I rarely have empty spaces in the studio, be they walls or floors, as I am always in transition, in motion, working on various things. Therefore, at first glance, I think my studio may have a chaotic and disorganized appearance. Bursts of ideas turn into an accumulation of objects amidst "pieces" of unfinished works and others finished but disarranged in space. But then it reveals itself as a box of surprises—even to me—where each of the elements and obstacles in the space is dismembered into arrangements of these same articulated ideas in works and possibilities. As more spontaneous foundations of thought, I use painting and drawing. Therefore, I always have scratchers, brushes, spatulas, sponges, sheets, canvases, etc., at hand, which I would define as "main" means in my artistic practice. I often refer to my notebooks of thoughts from nothing about everything, where I write and scribble, as well as to the typewriter. Despite its format and character limitations, the typewriter has served as a starter or unlocker of action.

4. PROCESS / STUDIO - What are the actions or routines that fuel your practice? What is your relationship with your studio?

Do not have a stagnant routine. The street is an extension of my studio: the movement of people, the noise and speed of cars, the sound and trajectory of birds, are all sources of inspiration. Having a coffee on the street with my agenda and notepads is an essential mental preparation base for my practice. In these moments, I try not to think or do anything, just let my body and brain enter a state of dormancy so that they begin to absorb the surroundings. It is there that ideas start to flourish, which usually end up in the notebook and later, perhaps, in a drawing, a painting, a sound, a sculpture. I see the studio only as the physical space where a set of experiences come together and materialize in new forms and languages. In this space, music helps to define the rhythm of work.

5. A WORK - Is there any artwork (in your production) that currently stands out? If yes, what does it propose?

Recently, I participated in a group exhibition ["Entre-Margens", V.N. da Barquinha, Jan. 27–Mar. 5, 2024], where I presented a work that I highlight because I think it is a good example of the articulation I make between various mediums and where I explore my relationship with wage labor and some poetics that I can extract from this experience. The piece, titled "Sucker List+Business Clouds (Combo)," is a simple and raw sculpture-structure, somewhat imperative in shape, where I install a framed drawing made with a typewriter at the base, and a sound horn on the pillar. The drawing that composes this combo, "Business Clouds," arises from a repetition in "organic" clusters of terms or expressions from the commercial glossary of the great capitalist machine, which transform into "clouds," ironically echoing the expression "cloud." Nowadays, "everything" is in the "cloud": social, labor, spiritual relationships, and our data, which are "essential cookies" to feed the system. The sound horns are usually used for public space with the aim of reaching the largest number of people and serve various purposes (propagandistic, advertising, informative, monitoring, or mass control, among others). In this work, it appears as an element of ironic subversion: the sound it emits is composed of voices of customers and telephone bugs captured in a work experience. I had an endless list of contacts to call for a customer satisfaction survey. Bored with this experience, I started contacting clients with my microphone muted and recording these calls. The result: unfooled customers speaking to the "void." As a background layer of sound, a vacuum cleaner recorded in another work experience, with a delay, reinforces the idea of brainwashing or alienation of the desired customer for commercial purposes.

6. RECURRENCE - Retrospectively; How would you define the recurrences in your work - conceptual or plastic?

Over time, I realized that my work functions a lot in a back-and-forth mode. I always return to ideas and forms from the past that sometimes have been "marinating" for years. I either continue them or they transform and open new paths. As I mentioned before, it is quite common for me to pick up my notebooks of ideas from nothing about everything, which I have been compiling for at least ten years, and search and collect ruminations on various topics. The typewriter has also always stimulated other works in the "backstage", I always return to this "medium" - it ultimately serves as an unlocker.

7. PERIPHERAL - In the evident context that we are a product of a time, how do you see your work portraying contemporary times?

My work reflects in various ways my empirical relationship with the world: I am naturally influenced by current working or housing conditions, I have some resistance to existing systems, I relate to the movement and rhythm of urban landscapes, I absorb daily new visual and communication languages; these are all ingredients of our times that I filter or use to create works in various forms and mediums.

8. IMPACT - What impact would you like your work to have?

I would like my work to be open enough for a new narrative to be created with each encounter. In terms of impact, I aim for my work to stimulate thought, provoke reflection, open horizons, challenge perception, and stimulate critical thinking, both individually and collectively. For future generations, I would like my work, together with all other remaining contemporary artistic manifestations, to serve as an object of understanding, learning, and reflection about the world at a certain moment in history.

9. AN ACTION - that "incorporates" or stimulates your work.

The actions or physical and also ocular movements of my wanderings through the city or the experience of various wage occupations that I do to support my artistic production are themselves stimulating for my work.

During the low season of setting up exhibitions—my most recurring source of income—I collaborate, for some years now, with an architect friend in carpentry and construction areas. This experience brought me forms, ideas, and materials for new pieces. The material we mostly work with comes from recycled urban waste, and I recognized attributes that could go beyond their mere structural/architectural function: I have created sculptures with this same material.

Another example: my poor relationship with the rental scooters that flood the city of Lisbon (and other large cities) led to spontaneous actions like throwing these objects off the sidewalks. These scooters have an alarm that varies depending on the manufacturing brand and sounds when they are moved without unlocking them in the application. I started recording the sounds of these alarms, and today they are part of the piece "City Birds," a composition of digital sounds from the cities reminiscent of a tropical forest.

I can affirm that my work is frequently stimulated by causality.

10. Name an artist "embedded" in practice / research.

It is not an easy task to name an artist as a reference in my practice because, for every tentacle of my research, at least two or three names immediately appear. I can, in freestyle mode, mention some recurring names in my research for various reasons: Martin Kippenberger, Oscar Murillo, Jannis Kounellis, Brice Marden, Rauschenberg, Albert Oehlen, Baselitz, Joan Mitchell, Santiago Sierra, Alan Kaprow, Sarah Lucas, Charlotte Posenenske…