Today we bring to you the project “Às 5, no Mercado”, an intervention of urban art of Chão do Loureiro car park.
The region of Lisbon is replete with street art. In addition to the open-air galleries of the social housing neighbourhoods that getLISBON has had the opportunity of sharing:
we can also observe works of this art form all across the city, including in the historic centre.
By joining Lisbon: Street Art Tour you can find other also fabulous urban artworks in the centre of Lisbon.
The Chão do Loureiro Car Park
Inaugurated in 2011, this park is located near São Jorge Castle. It results from a project of transformation of the building of the old Chão do Loureiro Market in a multifunctional space.
Solar panels were installed on top of the building, having it consequently become a reference point when it comes to an efficient use of energy and the use of renewable energy sources.
In addition to being a car park, there’s a supermarket on the ground floor and a restaurant on the rooftop, with a stunning view over the city and the Tagus river.
In the same building we have the Castelo-Baixa Lift, one of the equipment that helps both the residents and the visitors of Lisbon to overcome the ups and downs of this City of the Seven Hills.
Without further due, let’s explore the urban art of Chão do Loureiro car park.
“Às 5, no Mercado” – Urban Art of Chão do Loureiro Car Park
This project of urban art of Chão do Loureiro car park resulted from the initiative of EMEL, the city entity responsible for this park, in collaboration with GAU – Urban Art Gallery of the Department of Cultural Heritage of the City Council.
To enrich this space were invited 5 well-known national graffiters who spread their creative works across the 6 floors.
The best way of visiting this gallery is by starting on the 6th floor and going down on foot in a spiral all the way to the ground floor while admiring these fantastic artworks full of interesting details.
On each floor, next to the lifts, there’s a panel with information about each of the artists.
From the 6th floor to the 2nd floor we have respectively works from Ram, Mar, Miguel Januário, Paulo Arraiano and Nomen. And on the 1st floor we have joint works from the 5 artists.
With spray cans, brushes and paint rollers, each artist has left their messages and personal marks, conjugating creativity with the architecture.
6th Floor – Ram (1976)
We start on the 6th floor where we can observe paintings full of movement and colour, very characteristic of this artist.
The quick and rough strokes are both abstract elements, as well as components of nature: turbulent waves, flowers…
This is an appeal to the preservation of the environment and to the importance of recycling, which goes hand in hand with this floor, the most eco-friendly one, since it is destined for electric cars.
5th Floor – Mar (1974)
For the walls of the 5th floor, Mar brought us a story based on the surreal – the story of the Origami Hunter – which unravels throughout several episodes and includes creatures and different characters, with references to pop culture.
From the characters, we highlight the Hero with Alzheimer’s, who ironically forgets his own purpose.
In all of his work we can observe a conjugation of organic and rectilinear shapes in an explosion of colours and movements.
4th Floor – Miguel Januário (1981)
Moving on to the 4th floor we have Miguel Januário’s work, an artist from Porto who leaves us fascinated with the details of his recreation of the city of Lisbon.
According to the artist himself, Lisbon is a city of ethnicities, culture and of a mixture of influences; it’s a city of colour and light…
With a lively style, Miguel Januário fills the white walls with monuments, buildings, people, colour, movement…
3rd Floor – Paulo Arraiano (1977)
Contrary to all the other floors, here the almost monochromatic predominates. The space is dominated by brown, which is related to Mother Earth, old civilisations and to the mythological.
In this work, the artist evokes the relationship we have with our roots that many times end up fading into oblivion due to the overwhelming city life.
2nd Floor – Nomen (1974)
The self-taught artist Nomen provides us a mixture of calligraphy and photorealism.
Across the walls we can find complex, colourful, wild-styled and nearly illegible calligraphy pieces, which the artist himself admits to be what he “feels” the most. He equally likes photorealism, which he didn’t leave out in this project, incorporating it in the lettering through characters, portraits, faces and even a bird…
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1st Floor – Joint Work
Finally, on the ground floor we can admire one individual work of each artist, as well as two panels – a bigger one and a smaller one at the exit of the car park – where the 5 artists worked together.
With this we end our visit to the urban art of Chão do Loureiro car park, a peculiar exhibition space with artworks that are so different, but so deeply connected to the urban life, to our city of Lisbon.
Read also about:
– The Urban Art Faces in the Blue Wall
– The Urban Art of Entrecampos Station
– The Artivist Bordallo II in Lisbon
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