The Portuguese artist of Angolan origin, Mónica de Miranda, (Porto, 1976) is the winner of the fifth edition of the idealista Contemporary Art Award 2023 with her project “South Circular”. The award grants a financial endowment and the artist's participation with his or her work in idealista spaces at the real estate fairs in which it participates. Specifically, Mónica de Miranda will show the award-winning project by idealista at the stand that this company will exhibit at the next Madrid Real Estate Fair (SIMA) from May 24 to 27. The artist will present the project “South Circular”, a reflection on the city of Lisbon, more specifically on the military defensive wall that was built in 1899 to keep the French away from the Portuguese capital and which, a century later, became a territory inhabited by Africans from the former Portuguese colonies together with people from rural areas without the means to live in the desired prosperity.
This fortified line, called Campo de Trincheras, consists of a circular line that surrounds the northern side of the Portuguese capital and runs along a large part of the southern bank. In these spaces, the artist Mónica de Miranda visited ruins and areas newly inhabited by African communities and developed a narrative and visual framework of places and moments of historical significance, where memory, nostalgia and the vision of the modern city and its inhabitants coexist.
The exhibition “South Circular”, curated by Elisa Hernando and coordinated by Arte Global, consists of three photographs, a video and a map of the military road in the city of Lisbon, inviting the viewer to reflect on the constructions of the urban landscape and the epic ruins of the city. In this new space with its own identity, Miranda presents us with a combatant in uniform, listening to the news of the Angolan revolution on the radio; or the knight who rides his animal along the old military road, passing by former defence posts that now house the homeless. These are some of the characters that Miranda shows us as metaphors of time and space, opposites in constant intersection.
The idealista Contemporary Art Award is an initiative of the leading real estate marketplace in Spain, Italy and Portugal with which the company wants to recognize the talent and vision of young creators and seeks to promote and support contemporary artistic production. In its first edition, 2018, the award went to the Basque artist Ismael Iglesias (Durango, 1974), with the work "Streetfighter"; the second, in 2019, was won by the Huesca artist David Latorre (Huesca, 1973) with his project "Arquitectura, Cuerpo e Indumentaria"; in 2020 there was no call for entries due to the pandemic and in 2021 the award was won by Jorge Yeregui (Santander, 1975) for "Communities". The Cuban artist Hamlet Lavastida (Havana, 1983) was awarded the idealista award in 2022.
Why the Idealist Prize
idealista has been supporting national and international artists for years and promoting the artistic production of contemporary art by acquiring works of art that reflect the impact of “urbanism” on people’s lives. Its collection includes pieces by authors such as Panos Kokkinias (Athens, Greece, 1965), Teresa Margolles (Culiacán, Mexico, 1963), Maider López (San Sebastián, Spain, 1975), Olaf Breuning (Schaffhausen, Switzerland, 1970) and Massimo Vitali (Como, Italy, 1944). The works are part of an itinerant route between the company’s offices in Barcelona, Lisbon, Madrid, Málaga and Milan. For the creation of the “idealista Award”, and the coordination of the award in future editions, idealista has selected Elisa Hernando, director of Arte Global, who has curated the intervention by Mónica de Miranda at SIMA Madrid.
About Global Art
Arte Global is an international art consultancy dedicated to art collecting and cultural management projects for institutions, companies and individuals. Founded in 2003 by Elisa Hernando, Arte Global has reference clients such as Uría Menéndez Abogados, Fundación Banco Santander, ARCOmadrid, Repsol, idealista, among others.
About Monica de Miranda
She holds a BA in Visual Arts and Sculpture from Camberwell College of Arts (London) and a PhD in Art Studies from Middlesex University (London). In 2019 she was nominated for the New Artist Award at MAAT and in 2016 for the Novo Photo Banco Award, exhibiting as one of the finalists at the Museo Colección Berardo. The artist is represented by the Sabrina Amrani gallery.
His exhibitions in institutions and museums include: Foto fest (Houston, USA, 2020); Southern Biennial, MAAC (Guayaquil, Ecuador, 2020); MAAT Museum (Lisbon, Portugal 2019); Lubumbashi Biennale (Congo, 2019); Economic Bank (Luanda, 2019); Municipal Art Gallery, Almada, Portugal, 2019); Pera Museum (Istanbul, Türkiye 2017); Caixa Cultural (Rio de Janeiro and Brasilia, Brazil 2017-2018); Dakar Biennale in Senegal (2016); Casablanca Biennial (2016); Addis Photo Fest (2016); Palácio D. Manuel (Évora, Portugal, 2016); Museu Nacional de arte contemporânea do Chiado (Lisbon, Portugal, 2015); 14th Venice Architecture Biennale (2014); Sao Tome and Principe Biennial (2013); Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian (2008), among others.
His work is part of important collections of museums and institutions such as Calouste Gulbenkian, MNAC, MAAT, FAS, Centro Cultural de Lagos, Photographic Archive of Lisbon.
Mónica de Miranda is one of the founders of the Hangar project (Artistic residency in Lisbon in 2014).