Chim↑Pom from Smappa!Group

A major cultural institution, probably the best live art festival in Portugal, a curator specialising in Japanese contemporary art, a museum closed for renovation, a housing crisis, an artists‘ collective described as “the subversive face of the Japanese contemporary art scene”… These are the starting ingredients.

Then there’s the question of where to produce a work in situ in Lisbon that resonates with the artists’ themes, engages the community (residents, associations, local artists) and invites the public to experience a work outside the usual framework of institutions and theatres.

For this unusual project, ETC worked as an urban consultant alongside a rich number of stakeholders, forming part of a network that grew denser throughout the development of the project. The final choice fell on the Marvila district, where the Chim↑Pom from Smappa!Group collective set up its Side Trip, a temporary stage and an intense week-long programme of festivities open to all audiences and co-created with residents and artists from the neighbourhood and the city.