First Exhibition-Dialogue on Contemporary Art in Europe
Held between March and June 1985, the ‘First Exhibition-Dialogue on Contemporary Art in Europe’ was organised with the support of the Council of Europe and brought together a selection of works from eight international museums: in addition to the CAM, these included the Museum Moderner Kunst (Vienna), the Museum van Hedendaagse Kunst (Ghent), the Nationalgalerie Staatliche Museen Preußische Kulturbesitz (Berlin), the Galleria d’Arte Moderna (Rome), the Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen (Rotterdam), the Sonja Henie-Niels Onstad Foundations (Oslo) and the Moderna Museet (Stockholm).
Conceived as an exploration of European cultural identity and to promote a better understanding of the artistic movements and cultural changes of the day, the exhibition spread through various spaces in the Foundation, including two galleries in the Head Office and all the exhibition spaces in the Modern Art Centre. The exhibition also included a series of performances by some of the most prominent artists of the time, selected by the directors of the participating museums, as well as four colloquiums and round tables.
The CAM Collection was represented with three paintings by Ângelo de Sousa, a painting by António Costa Pinheiro and a textile work by Lourdes Castro. The exhibition was widely covered in the press and a bilingual catalogue was published, featuring introductory texts for all the institutions involved, as well as a preface by Michael Marschall von Bieberstein, of the Council of Europe, and José Sommer Ribeiro, director of the CAM. It also included an essay by René Berger, who was responsible for the initial development of the project.
História das Exposições
On the digital catalogue you can explore the 1343 exhibitions held by the Foundation between 1957 and 2016.
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