Hyperactive Memory Ruins
A project by Ricardo Cruzes and Joel Arantes
Joel and Ricardo have one thing in common, they both lived for many years in Lagos, Portugal, since they were young kids, and the fuel for their collaborative artistic practice is memory, formally activating ruins and places using their experimental art. Joel has been living in Oslo for nine years, and with an eight-year-old son born there, there are no plans of returning to Portugal for many more years, he has adapted, and he is finding his way into the Norwegian society and art scene. Ricardo, with a background in design and technology start-ups (he sold his company in 2021), lives in Lagos and is fully dedicated to his artwork. Joel is firmly attached to his home country, city, family, and friends. The will to create a connection between his new life and his home country has been growing every day, so he understood that by connecting to an artist in Lagos, he would create a creative channel to potentiate the execution of his sculptural works, installations and interventions related to architectonic spaces, materials, process- es, and the construction industry that strongly relate to the subject of memory. Ricardo has the experience of cooperating with other artists and saw this invitation as an excellent opportunity to evolve his work with memory as a theme. Part of his practice is conceptual, and he has been applying that experience to the work developed together with Joel. Joel’s method of working leads to the serendipity of situations that he tries to grab and explore, leading to the inclusion of elements in his work that are vessels for memories and stories that also are essential visual elements in the finalised piece. To start, the artists decided to search for ruins in Lagos regarding their architecture, location, and memory background. In their portfolio, it's possible to find multi-disciplinaryinterventions/installa- tions like construction layers activated by painting, conceptual quotes, stencil, light-related painting, standard sculpture, and sculpture by vacuum (removing oxygen from objects to preserve memories), objects assembly, sound recording and production, and documental interviews with key persons that were habitants or new habitants of the intervention places. For Joel and Ricardo, contact with the local communities is crucial for this project’s success because the real and honest testimonials of older people support the investigation that inspires the creation but also lead to new paths that come from the constant brainstorming to find the next project, always on continuity, gathering information that cannot be found on the books, information that is passed from generation to generation by word of mouth. The base for formal development is an experimental attitude, characteristic of these two artists. Ultimately, it's all about playing and having fun because they both have pleasant memories from their hometown, friends, and family. The first stage of the project is being created in Lagos. Still, the goal is to adapt and, in the future, explore the memory theme of other countries and cultures because Lagos, as a touristic place, allowed Joel and Ricardo to contact foreigners from all over the world from a very young age, and this was a plus for the mindset they have today, and for their art practice.
Instagram: @hyperactive_memory_ruins