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The

Artist

Nominated in
2025
By
Bienal Fotografia do Porto
Lives and Works in
Lisbon
João Bragança Gil (Lisbon, 1989) is an artist, based in Lisbon, Portugal. Attended the Painting course at the Faculty of Fine Arts of Lisbon between 2008 and 2010; Graduated in Industrial Design in 2013 from Escola Superior de Artes e Design. In 2014, Bragança Gil moved to London, graduating in MA Industrial Design at Central Saint Martins UAL in 2016. In 2019 Bragança Gil, moved to Lisbon, and started practicing fine arts full-time. Currently he’s pursuing a Media Arts PhD at Faculty of Fine Arts of Lisbon.‍Recent exhibitions include “Drop me in the river, Dip me in the water!” (2021) at Galeria Pedro Cera; “The sun, the oldest, the sheep, as the origin (on and on) and the klecks klecks” (2021), by Sismógrafo at Casa das Artes, Porto; “CODA” (2022) at Buraco, Lisbon, “Uncertain Strata” at EGEU; “Estudo do Meio”, Carpintarias de S. Lázaro; “Midnight Sun”, Mono. Recidency at Arquipélago — Centro de Artes Contemporâneas, São Miguel, with FetArt (France) and CiCLO (Portugal). In 2023, Bragança Gil presented “Artificial Paradises” (2023) a solo exhibition at the National Museum of Science and Natural History, resulting from more than two years of research.‍In 2024, participated in the group exhibition “Entre Margens” curated by João Pinharanda and the group show “Passages” at Galeria Encounter; and the solo exhibition “Trouble in Paradise” at (Projectspace) at the Encounter and Jahn und Jahn Gallery, in Lisbon.
Projects
2020

Anticline

In the anticline of Estremoz-Borba-Vila Viçosa in Alentejo, is located one of the oldest and most productive marble extraction industries in Portugal and the Iberian Peninsula that has deeply marked this region. The movie approaches the problematic of the transformation of the environment into commodities, from a point of view that intends to be that of the stone itself, in which we can find the huge quarries, some more than a hundred meters deep, thus exposing these monumental scars. The testimony falters between the stone, the machines and the landscape, where humanity seemingly ceased to exist. The narrative documents fragments of this exploration, where we find habitats dominated by cranes and disfigured by heavy machinery, functioning almost as an industrial archeology, in which we are placed as witnesses at the center of a scar that extends for over 40 kilometres and whose epicentre is a tragic landslide of a 100-meter stretch of road, in November 2018, which claimed a number of fatal victims. Observing the ecology of the different players, Anticline brings to the surface traces and artefacts composed of micro-narratives that document and witness the profound and continuous subjugation of the landscape.
2022

(in)Visible

“I try to let the film think. “
— Harun Farocki


The Azores are an archipelago in the ‘middle’ of the Atlantic. Due to their privileged geographical position, these islands have been a place of enormous importance throughout history. This video essay aims to explore the visibilities and invisibilities inherent to the political agendas behind this geographical position through a two-channel video work that juxtaposes images of the magnificent landscapes often portrayed in Tourism advertisements, with media images of Lajes Airport, an important transnational military complex from the First World War to the present day.
The contrast of these two visual sequences composed of ‘found-image’ seeks to reflect on the politics of landscape and its representation, through the simultaneous, although paradoxical, discourses in these locations.
The film is accompanied by the soundtrack “Conquest of Paradise” (1992), by Vangelis, transformed and edited by me, slowing it down more than ten times, transforming it into an almost unrecognizable environment, with about forty-five minutes of duration. Each of these three elements — two videos and a soundtrack — has a different duration, creating asynchronous ‘loops’ and generating endless interactions, combinations and readings, in time.

João Bragança Gil
was nominated by
Bienal Fotografia do Porto
in
2025
Show all projects
Each year every member of the FUTURES European Photography Platform nominates a set of artists and projects to become part of the FUTURES network.

Inês Quente’s They Dream Not is a research project, initiated through an ArtsIceland international artistic residency and expanded in Aveiro, Portugal. The work, incorporating alternative and historical photography, analog film, drawing and collage, investigates places rich in nature, with diverse geography and weather conditions, to understand the profound relationship between the Earth and all its inhabitants (Animal/Plant/Fungus). Quente lives in Lisbon and has an MA in Documentary Filmmaking from the University for the Creative Arts, UK, and a BA from the Faculty of Fine Arts, University of Porto, Portugal.

Emanuel Constantino is interested in the practical process of photography in analog format and the unpredictability of the results it offers. His project (…) se elas houverem, a gente vai tirá-las (if there are any, we'll take them out) examines the universe of documentary and fiction in their various intersections and interactions. This curious, inventive body of work was activated by Constantino’s discovery of an online archive – the 1995 Radio and Television Portugal broadcast titled ‘Rumour about Piranhas in the River Ave’. Constantino lives in Porto and has a BA in Photography from the School of Media Arts and Design in Porto, Portugal where he is currently undertaking a MA in Cinema and Photography.

Drawing inspiration from Walter Benjamin’s ideas on mechanical reproduction, Jessica Gaspar’s project Cells investigates how digital apparatuses can expand our sensory capabilities. The camera becomes an extension of vision, unveiling layers of reality beyond what the naked eye perceives. Just as microscopy reveals hidden worlds, Cells proffers an alternative lens to the everyday, an intersection between the organic and the artificial. Gaspar lives in Porto and holds a PhD in Science and Technology of the Arts from Universidade Católica Portuguesa, Porto, Portugal and a BVA from the Universidade Lusófona, Lisbon, Portugal.

To João Bragança Gil João The Origin (On&On) is a type of ‘origin’ that approaches and retreats, meets and diverges. The project utilizes pre-digital media of carousel and photo slides to project a circular notion of time. The tangibility of the process slows time and creates a reflective viewer engagement, with time, as we know it, transformed. Based in Lisbon, Bragança Gil has a BA in Industrial Design from the School of Arts and Design, Caldas da Rainha, Portugal; an MA in Industrial Design from Central Saint Martins, UK, and a BA from the Faculty of Fine Arts, Universidade Lisboa, Portugal where he is currently pursuing a PhD in Media Arts.

Patricia Assiss's project terceira pálpebra (third eyelid) brings together a photographic series taken in urban spaces. The monochromatic images appear as a collection of apparently opaque, inert gestures, as if paralysed in an uncertain time, but which simultaneously reveal a city in movement and transformation. Lisbon based, Assiss has a an MA in Culture Studies from the Universidade Católica Portuguesa, Lisbon, Portugal, and is a Post-Graduate in Contemporary Photography Discourses, Faculty of Fine Arts, Universidade de Lisboa, Portugal, where she also achieved a Bachelor in Political Science and International Relations.

Selection committee

Virgílio Ferreira and Jayne Dyer, Co-Artistic Directors, Bienal Fotografia do Porto 2025

Vera Carmo, independent curator