Chairs and roundabouts

BY LENA STRANG

Roundabouts proliferate in Portugal, but so does the engaging public art that often adorns these traffic islands. For years many of us in Lagos have negotiated the emblematic Chairs Roundabout on the Avenida da República. Last December an intriguing set of new chairs, looking distinctly different, appeared on the island. They were initially covered in tarpaulin and then revealed in all their glory, arousing a great deal of curiosity. Why were they substituted and what’s the significance of the chairs?

My trail leads to Vera Gonçalves, a distinguished sculptor who has been working in Lagos for over 40 years. I spend an interesting afternoon in her atelier in Espiche and learn about her background, her artwork and why the Chairs Roundabout is so special to her.

Vera was born in Lisbon and grew up in an artistic environment with her mother being a painter and father, a well-known architect. "I always mingled with artists and visited lots of exhibitions and museums. Conversations in the house inevitably centred on these topics. I had my perfect aesthetic education at home," she smiles. It was hardly surprising then that she chose to embark on a career as a sculptor.

She completed a Fine Arts course in Lisbon, but Lagos beckoned in the form of João Cutileiro. He is an eminent sculptor, perhaps best known for designing the sculpture of King Sebastian in 1973 that still takes centre stage on Praça Gil Eanes.

"I wanted to create something meaningful that is intimately connected with our own lives and history"

"In 1978 I moved to Lagos along with three other colleagues of Fine Arts to work with Cutileiro," she explains. What followed was an intensive apprenticeship, learning to work with marble and heavy stone cutting machines and helping to design a series of sculptures. "He was a great disciplinarian," Vera remembers. "We had to work from early morning to late at night, but we learned how to master the material."

All this stood her in good stead when she opened her atelier a year later. "Well, it was a space without a roof, had no electricity. I did the heavy work outside on the road," she says. Little by little she transformed the building into the space where we are now seated. There is a solid roof, high-level windows letting in the light and numerous tables and workbenches displaying her work. She points to the other side of the road where her own house stands surrounded by a verdant garden. Her creative talents came to the fore again as she transformed a shepherd’s cottage with surroundings eaten bare by goats and sheep, into an oasis.

The period of working with heavy stone and marble has passed and what I see in the atelier are smaller, more delicate pieces made out of natural material that she finds on beaches and in the countryside that she scours. She loves transforming objects that many don’t even notice and bestowing them with meaning. She’s had innumerable exhibitions of work Vera in her atelier in Lisbon and Lagos over the years and ran a shop on Lagos Marina for fifteen years where she and fellow artists displayed and sold their artwork. Nowadays she is happy to take on commissions for work such as smaller-scale sculptures and ornaments for the garden or the house.

My attention, however, is drawn to the presence of chairs - framed engravings of chairs on the walls, various drawings and small white models on the workbench. Come on, Vera, why chairs on the roundabout?

Vera in her atelier

It’s a long story. In 1999 Vera was approached by the then President of the Câmara who was keen on public art, and she was asked to do a sculpture. She very much wanted to create something to commemorate the Revolution of the 25th April 1974, exactly 25 years after the momentous event. Vera remembers well the terrifying time of the dictatorship and the repercussions on everyday life: "There was constant fear as we heard about friends who had been arrested and simply disappeared. Life was all hemmed in and we couldn’t talk openly outside the confines of the house." She was part of anti-fascist and anti-colonial associations and board member of the student council, "always working towards the goal of liberation and a different world."

She tells me that she happened to be in the Algarve on the very day of the revolution: "I listened to the radio in the morning and heard about the MFA (Armed Forces Movement) and the bloodless revolution unfolding. I was so happy that the 25th of April had finally arrived! It should always be remembered." And this is what Vera set out to do in the form of her sculpture on the roundabout.

She decided on the location carefully. "I didn’t want a scenic place with tourist appeal that would be featured on pretty postcards. Instead, I wanted to create something meaningful that is intimately connected with our own lives and history." Before 1999 there was a small roundabout in the same place that was notoriously accident-prone. The area was bleak with social housing and few green spaces. She thinks the decision to site the new roundabout there helped in the process of making the area more pleasant and green. "And the number of accidents was drastically reduced overnight," she adds.

And the chairs? "Before and after the revolution, where would we have been discussing issues and deciding to take action?" Vera muses, "Sitting on chairs of course!" This was the first image that came to her mind – people seated in groups, pondering and talking to each other. The idea of giving an everyday object further significance also appealed to her.

When she drew up the project, she decided on the size of each chair in relation to the roundabout and the right number for the space. Seven turned out to be right, "being a beautiful number in itself," she contends. The initial chairs made out of durable polycarbonate were produced in Holland. They were solid constructions, perhaps representing a stable foundation needed for building a new, promising future in Portugal.

Twenty years on the chairs had suffered the passage of time and needed to be replaced. She was again approached by the city council and agreed to take on the commission. The new project, from initial design to completion in December 2019, took one year. Vera is pleased that the whole production process this time was done locally in Lagos. Why are they so different in appearance compared to the old ones? Vera tells me she was given total freedom to re-invent the chairs. Made of iron and painted white they still represent a meeting place where there is an exchange of ideas and fellowship. Although each weighs 400 kg, they seem lighter and airy, being intertwined by iron wires. Vera explains: "We live in a different kind of society now which is intersected by social networks that join us. There is a lot of communication and knowledge but also empty spaces that we need to fill. We still have much to discover. It is in this world of infinite possibilities that the new roundabout exists."

Although the Chairs Roundabout has been completed there is still much to be done. Vera is working on a series of seven framed engravings of the chairs that she will subsequently offer for sale. There are also innumerable drawings and small model chairs that she has produced. When she has caught her breath, she will stage an exhibition of the whole process. Further details will follow.

On the 25th of this month, there will again be a commemoration in every town and city up and down the country. It is worth pausing by the Chairs Roundabout to ponder on the commemorative plaque on the pavement that in three words encapsulates the spirit of the revolution and Vera’s work: Liberty, Dialogue and Democracy.

+INFO: veraespiche@gmail.com

Two films about Vera’s work and of the Chairs Roundabout can be watched on Youtube. Just click on the name of Vera Gonçalves or go to the specific videos by title: A Natureza é uma Jóia - Vera Faria Gonçalves or Rotunda das Cadeiras 2019, Vera Gonçalves Escultura