luta luto

Jewels for Democracy, exhibition, II Lisbon Contemporary Jewellery Biennial, Museu do Tesouro Real, Lisboa, 2024

3D printing (PLA)

 
 
“O Pavão Negro” (“The Black Peacock”), poem written for an exhibition of the writer/painter Ana Hatherly, presented in Porto in 1999, serves as a motto for “luta luto”, piece to “see-read” that plays with the words and its meanings, in an allusion to the “silent scream” that found voice in the daybreak of April 25th of 1974.

50 years. 50 times we write, read, repeat “luta luto”, until the words break free from its weight, “now dissolved in the seduction of the aesthetic object”. Word, blur, “suspended waterfall”, in which the black ink that writes, gains the three-dimensionality and movement that the drawing only alluded to.

Built as a necklace, we look here to a conceptual object, for its dimension and fragility - even though its strength resides in its impermanence as well. For the collar it’s simply used the PLA filament before it is placed in the 3D printing pen, for its ergonomic shape and the desire to simplify the choice of techniques and materials - as if the piece was a continuous drawing, ready to become alive. Placed in the body as in a sheet of paper: “Only then does it unfold / the radiant charm / of its fragile mystery”.

(The quotes throughout the text are from Ana Hatherly, taken from the preface and poem in three parts “O Pavão Negro”, included in the book with the same name. Free translation by the author.)

Note: “luta luto” is a wordplay in Portuguese, “luta” referring to “fight” (noun) and “luto” with two meanings: also “fight” (but now in the verb form, first person singular, as in “I fight”) and/or “grief/mourning” (noun).

luta, luto, limited edition

sterling silver

Special limited edition of 50 copies, all different, inspired by the original piece “luta luto”, created to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the 25th of April of 1974 (the end of the dictatorship in Portugal). 

Each pair of pins is accompanied by a numbered and signed leaflet, which explains the concept of the piece.

Spread the message, share, wear with pride. Fight for freedom, always. #50Anos25Abril