the street is our gallery

April 09, 2021 to May 22, 2021

Underdogs is finally reopening its space to the public, starting with two exhibitions, featuring talented Portuguese artists Add Fuel and Halfstudio.

After having been the first exhibition featured in the Underdogs Online Viewing Room, CHRONOS REDUX can now be visited and seen in person. With this presentation, artist Add Fuel echoes the haphazard and uncertain pace that 2020 imposed on us through a series of pieces that reflect on the passage of time. Keeping true to the style and themes of his body of work, strongly rooted in the idea of revisiting and rethinking the past, CHRONOS REDUX comprises pieces that embody a dialogue between linearity and cyclicity, between continuity and intermittence, between innovation and patternisation.

Including works in azulejo, compositions spray painted on wood and sculptural pieces, its aesthetic fluctuates between a re-exploration of previously developed motifs and subject matter in new formats, new compositions and new colour schemes, as well as entirely innovative patterns that reflect a reappraisal of the past with a view to suggest new future itineraries.

CHRONUS REDUX

Add Fuel is Portuguese visual artist Diogo Machado (b. 1980). His artistic practice has been focused on reinterpreting and playing with the language of traditional tile design, and that of the Portuguese tin-glazed ceramic azulejo in particular. Blending traditional and contemporary elements, his original vector-based designs and stencil-based street art reveal an impressive complexity and a masterful attention to detail.

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– We Still Have a Dream
HALFSTUDIO

Solo exhibition – Underdogs Capsule
9 APRIL – 22 MAY 2021

CHRONUS REDUX

Based on the reuse of discarded objects – handsaws, circular saws, paintings, a metal letter from a commercial sign, or light boxes, among others, recovered and primed in order to receive painted or printed works –, the set of pieces that gives shape to We Still Have a Dream explores the idea of recovery, of giving a “second chance” – both to the very objects and, symbolically, to humanity itself in the present context.

After the unprecedented scale of negative news and information the world was faced with during 2020, as well as the upsurge in confrontations, extremism, intolerance and injustice, this exhibition provides an escape, founded on the belief that love, compassion, hope, tolerance and courage are essential to overcoming the hardest of challenges.

Halfstudio is a Portuguese lettering and sign painting studio established by Mariana Branco (b. 1986) and Emanuel Barreira (b. 1986) which develops projects in various creative fields always with lettering as the central element. Their visual language is characterised by the use of three-dimensional letters and dynamic layouts with striking messages and vibrant colours.