On Saturday, February 14th, at 5 pm, Isabel Carvalho's exhibition Arder a Palavra (Burning the Word) will open at Lugar do Desenho - Fundação Júlio Resende, in Valbom.
In Arder a Palavra, Isabel Carvalho presents a set of ceramic panels resulting from research that combines science and artistic practice, reviving traditional knowledge in which vegetal ashes were used in the formulation of ceramic glazes. The ashes chosen for the project were mainly collected in areas affected by the fires that occurred during the summer of 2025 in the Douro region, one of the areas that suffered the greatest environmental impact that year.
The research initially focused on the behaviour of vegetal material in vitrification processes, analysing how different species — such as oak, pine and eucalyptus, present in varying proportions according to their flammability — produced specific ceramic responses. However, the work gradually shifted in another direction, based on practice and the realisation that, in a real context, the strict separation of species proves to be chimerical outside laboratory conditions. The contamination between materials — since fire indiscriminately converts all “living” matter into ashes — as well as the subsequent impregnation of the air, soil and waterways, became a structural part of the project itself.
In this way, the research expanded beyond continuous technical advancement and improvement, taking on a symbolic dimension inseparable from what we see as environmental collapse.
For Arder a Palavra, the ceramics workshop at Lugar do Desenho opened up as a space for situated production. Its unique conditions further reinforced the notion of contamination as an operative concept, both through the occasional use of glazes and kilns belonging to Júlio Resende, and through the choice of drawing — a central area in this institution — as the matrix for the process of transposing the material paths onto the panel support. In fact, the exhibition shows a sensitive attention to natural cycles and landscape transformations, articulating artistic practice and ecological reflection around the ecosystems of the Douro River, with the panels being taken as devices of inscription and memory.
Support: Lugar do Desenho - Fundação Júlio Resende; Earthsea Association and DGArtes.