Translator: Angie Yaeyama Reviewer: Darina Stoyanova
So today, I'll be sharing with you
some insights into my collection I called "Transparency."
It's a collection of art pieces that looks at the growing issue
of the glacier melting.
But before, I'd like to share with you that is the marriage of my...
...how can I say, the marriage of my source of inspiration and my work.
And to the message I want to share,
it's about the cause that we can see happening right now
as the consequences of the climate change.
[Music playing]
My work has taken me to so many places in the world
starting from Portugal to India
to Angola in Africa, and now Calgary.
After traveling around the world looking for strong colors
and new cultures, I've decided to come to Canada, and here,
start a new experience in my life with new people,
new culture and new terms of colors,
always thinking about the intimate relationship
between humans and nature.
A few years ago, I visited Norway
and for the first time in my life I materialized this idea
about climate change and the terrible consequences for all of us.
I thought to myself how insignificant we are compared to nature,
but like a virus we have this ability to cause so much damage in nature.
So, for my own personal research,
I spoke with a lot of people about this big issue
and I became quite surprised,
because they didn't seem very concerned about that problem.
So I decided to use my work,
and through it share and spread this message about climate change.
I know that I'm not a scientist or a mathematician or even a doctor.
I'm just an ordinary person, an artist.
But I thought that perhaps if I bring my work to people,
I could reach them better than those statistical projections and studies.
I do really believe that through art we can create an universal language
that everyone understands the message.
Through art, we can reach all without frontiers or obstacles.
So I created my projects, "Transparency,"
and like those examples of my paintings there I caught water and ice fragments
that you saw before on the video.
My main goal was to understand and communicate this tension between
the enduring power of the glaciers and their fragility.
However, the idea that we could have about the eternal resistance
of the glacier is only a mistake,
as the glaciers have been melting into the ocean like if they never existed.
This piece I called "Water Turmoil."
This painting is like the metaphoric idea that even if we can see beauty there
underneath that surface something dangerous is happening.
Something that we cannot see or control,
but is there happening at this right moment - the melting.
From my own research reading scientific studies,
I learned that ice preserves for thousands of years
information about Earth's climate history.
That information is there and we can use it to understand deeper
about our past, how to live better in our present,
and how to improve our future.
To learn that, it worked on me like
a magical source of inspiration to develop my art projects.
I remember there was a couple
who came to my exhibition in Toronto last July,
and they were shocked when they saw this piece I called "Frozen Iceberg."
They were from Newfoundland
and they told me when they saw this painting
they really thought it was a real piece of an iceberg on the wall.
They were quite touched, even emotional, saying that when they were children
they used to play outside and always seeing those floating icebergs
on the sea like a legendary scenario.
They expressed how much worried they were about the climate change
and the consequences.
And also, how deeply sad they were because
those floating icebergs and the magical memories will disappear someday.
They were very surprised what a Portuguese-Anglo man
was so worried about what's happening in the North,
and the reality is that what effects one of us effects all of us.
And because of that, I thought maybe if I could bring my work to people
eventually I can share this idea about global warming
as a common problem to all mankind.
As an artist, I want to use all my own tools to help.
I just want to be part of the solution rather than the problem.
We are all responsible for everything.
In my humble opinion, I think that we all should gather together,
and through our own talents, to do the best as we can
to try to save the planet.
Because it's an obligation, it's mandatory, it's our legacy.
Although, I know that my work, it's only a drop in the ocean,
but you know something I really love to imagine that drop
falling in the ocean and through those rings of water
spread this message of hope around the world like the butterfly effect.
Thank you very much.
(applause)