(Re)-Vista ao Porto

By: Marília Sousa

November 2019

Only those who are from Porto, or have visited Porto, know what it is to belong to the history of this city. To the blue of the sea or the river, the gray of the autumn sky, or the orange of the sunny late afternoon.

These and many more are the sensations that are suggested in this exhibition by the photographer João Torres Neves, which were performed when he returned to his hometown after spending a season in Vila Real. It was at this moment that the photographer found a port full of contrasts: sometimes for the exuberance of the tourist, sometimes for the simplicity, and even precariousness, of the locals.

Here, the absence, the presence, the loneliness, the crowd, the time or the lack of it, are linked through the exhibition and intend to praise through the colors, contrasts, textures and scenes represented, what makes our city a place so dear to all who live or visit it.

Born in 1987 in the city of Porto, João Torres Neves studied in Multimedia and later graduated in Theater and Performing Arts.

Although he admits that his background is intrinsically linked to the way he feels about photography, the photographer assumes that the season he spent outside his city and living in Vila Real was crucial to the work he presents us today. This is because it was at the time of the “homecoming” that he created an intimate and strong relationship with the place that saw him grow and felt a real need to portray it through his lens.

João Torres Neves has the practice of doing work “on the spot”, and says that for him, it is essential to have a link with the place where he produces it. He also thinks that his engine of artistic production is the emotion and sensation of the site depicted, and in this case, Porto is for him, in the first resort, the place that influ­enced his growth, and secondly, a place of study, rediscovered now in his mature phase.

It is also important to emphasize that his photography is of digital typology “in camera”, that is, conceived without any manipulation, and this practice is for him a recorded experience of his daily life experiences, that are intended for the ultimate transmission of the sensation of what he sees, smells, hears and feels at the moment and place of the click.

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