BACKPACK ALMANAC

"BACKPACK ALMANAC" A solo by Francisco Mendes Moreira

16 May –– 31 August 2024

The title of Francisco Mendes Moreira’s exhibition for Everyday Gallery, Backpack Almanac, is intriguing. The juxtaposition of these two words orchestrates a clash between different ways of seeing and engaging with the world around us. Both the almanac and the backpress express a desire to know the world around us, but the way they do so differs significantly. Whereas an almanac is a booklet full of useful data organized in convenient categories and tables that are ready for practical use, backpacking implies a much more intuitive encounter with the world, spontaneously traveling from one place to the next with nothing but more than what we can fit in a backpack.

The creatures that populate Mendes Moreiras’s work are perhaps only partly human. The scenes in which they appear and the landscapes and objects that Mendes Moreira develops, are elements in a world that is beginning to morph into a dream. Neither almanac nor backpack, these figures and objects are stuck somewhere in between reality and illusion. Embracing that dreamlike state, Mendes Moreira’s work encourages us to use our illusion, as the title of one of his paintings in this show suggests.

Text by Bram Ieven

BACKPACK ALMANAC : A solo by Francisco Mendes Moreira

"BACKPACK ALMANAC" A solo by Francisco Mendes Moreira

Cookie preferences

Join our mailing list