36h no Porto

Ai, ai, que saudades do Porto... a culpa, desta vez, é do New York Times, que nos leva à descoberta da cidade, no artigo 36 hours in Porto, misturando sugestões de locais recentes (como o restaurante DOP, do chefe Rui Paula, que, fiquei a saber, tem uma lista de vinhos do Douro com 60 páginas!), com outros mais tradicionais, como a incontornável Manteigaria do Bolhão, maravilhosamente descrita, desta forma: "stocks enough cured meat to feed a corporate picnic (or spark a PETA protest)"...

As fabulosas fotos são, como já vai sendo costume, do nosso João Pina.

Chegámos à Madeira...

(Alberto João Jardim na 1ª página do Int. Herald Tribune, foto de João Pina)

Foi um choque para as Finanças portuguesas, e para os portugueses em geral, sim, podemos confirmar. É essa a ideia que o jornalista do International Herald Tribune passa logo no título que escolheu para a primeira página da edição hoje impressa, «Untimely schock to Portugal's finances»...

No Funchal, acompanhando a campanha eleitoral, o jornalista Raphael Minder escreve um artigo elucidativo (com fotos do «nosso» João Pina):

«(...) in the run-up to the vote Sunday, Mr. Jardim was busy presiding over several inauguration ceremonies for projects, even as criticism from Lisbon intensified. Last Wednesday, he opened a tunneled road that will provide access to a still unfinished golf course.»

Infelizmente, nada de novo para nós, portugueses. Mas que dirão os leitores do Tribune, no final de frases como esta?

«The politicians pass laws in the Parliament in the morning and then do business among themselves in the afternoon».

Bom, talvez se internacionalize a expressão «já chegámos à Madeira?»...

Guimarães, by New York Times

(Foto: João Pina para o New York Times)

Aquela que será a Capital Europeia da Cultura em 2012 merece este fim-de-semana o destaque do suplemento de viagens do New York Times. Em The Arts Take Root in Portugal’s ‘Cradle City’, o jornalista Charly Wilder enaltece a herança histórica da cidade mas também dá atenção aos locais noturnos mais trendy, à nova cozinha e, claro, aos movimentos culturais que estão a dar uma outra vida à cidade-berço de Portugal. As fotos são do "nosso" João Pina.

Genial é a descrição de um dos locais recomendados para comer (ou para visitar...), a típica cervejaria Martins. Ora leiam:

"A taste of old, rough-around-the-edges Guimarães can be found at Cervejaria Martins, a beer joint on stately Toural Square. Morning to night, men sit around the large horseshoe bar among a clutter of ceramic beer mugs and soccer scarves, watching televised bullfights, snacking on fat shrimp and bowls of tremoço beans and downing 90-cent draughts. Not much has changed here since it first opened in 1951; the lighting is unromantic, the beer is Super Bock (the brand most common to Portugal’s north) and the conversation is deliciously unrefined.

Though Guimarães’ newfound cultural prowess is a decided draw, the legions of new visitors headed for the city in the next year — from residents of outlying villages to international cultural stars like the French director Jean-Luc Godard — would be remiss not to experience the provincial charms of spots like Martins. That said, if you’re a vegetarian, it may be advisable to bring your own salad."

Grandes histórias

(Foto: João Pina/ Kameraphoto para El País)

Imperdível este artigo do El País sobre o milionário Douglas Tompkins, que já comprou centenas de milhares de hectares de terra virgem, sobretudo na América Latina, apenas para assegurar que o Homem não as destruirá... as fotografias são do «nosso» João Pina.

Parabéns, Mr. Pina

Já aqui falei várias vezes do João. Mas façam lá o favor de ouvir-me mais uma vez... Hoje, o New York Times publica um artigo sobre ele, apresentando-o assim:

João de Carvalho Pina, a young Portuguese photographer, has spent the past five years documenting the abuses of Operation Condor, a collusion among right-wing dictators in Latin America during the 1970s to eliminate their leftist opponents.

Neste artigo, Tracing the Shadows of Operation Condor, o João explica porque decidiu fotografar os locais onde milhares de pessoas foram mortas e torturadas (sítios aparentemente banais, como garagens, escritórios, estádios de futebol...) e porque acha importante revelar os rostos dos sobreviventes:

“My goal is to create a visual memory of what this period was, the places of the disappeared and the survivors and the families, and to show people that this actually happened,” Mr. Pina said. “There are hundreds of thousands of people affected by it.”

In a way, he is one of those affected. Two of Mr. Pina’s grandparents in Portugal, who were Communists, were jailed as subversives for many years by the dictatorship of António de Oliveira Salazar. That part of his family history led him to document the abuses of the Salazar regime. He took the photographs in “For Your Free Thinking,” published in Portugal in 2007, about former political prisoners. In many cases, he juxtaposed mug shots from the time with updated portraits of the subjects, in similar poses.“I was really feeling a kind of desperation,” he said. “The generation of my grandparents was disappearing, and there were no documents of it.”

Documenting the past, of course, is a paradox. The subjects are no longer around, the occurrences are over, actions exist in past time. So inevitably, Mr. Pina has to find a way to evoke vanished events. “My goal here was to bring viewers to where they can see there’s something strange in those pictures, and they don’t know why.”