Opening: Tuesday October, 28th, 6 p.m.
Starting from the symbolism of a single drop of water, this exhibition invites reflection on multiple levels – on identity, time, and resilience in East Timor, the youngest nation in Southeast Asia, emerging after nearly 500 years of foreign occupation. Water serves as both metaphor and medium: a primordial mirror for self-reflection, a purifying force that signals renewal, and a disputed space where history and the future converge. The works on display interrogate water not as a passive element, but as an active articulation of contemporaneity: its fluidity echoes the precariousness of our time, its depths reflect the disorientation of reconstruction, and its ubiquity links collective memory to individual transformation.
The exhibition traces how water embodies paradox – global yet intimate, destructive yet life-giving – to explore themes such as origin, displacement, and flow. Fire emerges dialectically, representing conflict as a melting pot for growth: the friction of diverse perspectives that sparks cultural metamorphosis. Through their works, the artists explore water’s dual capacity to heal and disturb, wondering how societies – and individuals – might navigate uncertainty to envision fluid identities.
BIENALSUR Dili was produced by Fundação Oriente Timor-Leste
Director: Joana Saraiva
Producer: Susanna Rossi
Image: Juventino Madeira