We (Sofia Dias, Lilia Mestre and Vitor Roriz) worked from 16:00 till 20:00 4 days a week for two weeks with the premise of slow motion.
We embodied shapes that are referential to us as “sacred” and worked with the “passions” as supported images constituting our emotional society. The working zone was constantly updated by the daily experiences in the gallery space. These experiences floated from quotidian action, gesture and behavior to the sacred ecstatic action, gesture and behavior. It was very interesting to find the relation and inter action between these elements and to be able to "affect" the community of down town Torres Vedras.
How to relate to the quotidien environment that surrounded Transforma AC? We called “the dog concept” the approach we had with the community and that the community had with us. It seemed that our potential audience and us had to get used to each other to be able to communicate. One of the strategies was to film the outside and project it inside in order to create familiarity. We also had a camera filming the square and projected it on the window so people could see themselves as part of what was going on.
The “working zone” distabled the clear reading of the very known Christian figures of Mary and Joseph. We invited people to negotiate what they know with questions about what they know. It was clear that the "sacred" was recognized and that the slow motion created friction and an hyper-reality. But it was also clear that the on going process that we establish was in contradiction with the idea of result.
By the end of the second week a group of old man was standing in front of the gallery reading the text that was scrolling down on the screen. On the weekend people from the country side would spend longer time contemplating us. Children read out loud the texts and some thought we were aliens...
