Start Festival Iminente. Working with communities is one of the highlights

The Iminente Festival, which combines music and plastic arts, was held for the first time in 2016, in Oeiras, moving to the 3rd edition, in 2018, to Lisbon.

In a first phase, António Brito Guterres, from the Iminente programming team, in statements to Lusa, held ‘workshops’ in the festival grounds, facing the communities of some neighborhoods of the capital, which then took place in the territories of these communities.

Today, these people are present at the festival in various ways, “some invisible, case of those who work in the production and assembly of the festival, and others visible, such as those who have exposed their works or go on stage during the festival”.

This year, the project Neighborhoods returned to work with associations and communities of Alta de Lisboa, Quinta do Lavrado and Bairro Branco, but arrived for the first time in the neighborhoods of Madredeus, Alfinetes, Salgadas, Quinta do Marquês de Abrantes and Quinta do Chalé. Mostly neighborhoods located in the eastern part of the city.

“ Although we have extended the places where we do the ‘workshops’, we have always invested in doing it in the same places,” said António Brito Gueterres, adding that “the idea is to be able to deepen” the work in these “exclusion territories of Greater Lisbon, which have very few resources”.

The workshops cover several areas, such as visual arts, music, performance, design and cinema, and are thought in partnership with local associations.

This year, for example, guitarist, composer and multidisciplinary artist Nuno Cintrão was at Quinta do Lavrado to boost a workshop for the construction of instruments and musical experimentation, in partnership with Generation with the Future.

The Fritta Workshop took silkscreen printing to Alta de Lisboa, for a series of workshops, developed with the Association Bairro da Quinta Grande.

“The Imminent enters these territories with ‘workshops’ ensures that, at least in the area of culture and art, there are some kind of activities for people there. And in doing so for several years, it implies that this has some impact on the lives of those people,” said António Brito Guterres, recalling that the associations of these neighborhoods often have projects, but not the funding necessary to achieve them.

The results of the various workshops are presented during the festival, both on display and on stage.

The associations of the various neighborhoods will also be in the enclosure, in the Arraial space.

“ The neighborhoods bring their food and sell it, and this is important for families ", he said. In addition to food, there are also stalls selling other products, clothing, accessories or books.

“Many of the ‘workshops’, at the request of the neighborhoods, are ‘workshops’ whose result turns into products, into sweaters to sell, for example, and this also has a return to the associations. Eventually some also take the experience of the Iminent and make applications for funding,” said António Brito Guterres.

In this edition, the neighborhoods of Lisbon are also represented at the festival through local clubs, in a project by António Brito Guterres and Ayton César Monteiro, with genesis in a work that both developed for the ‘site’ Message of Lisbon.

The two had “conspirated the idea of being able to make a ‘rebrending’ of the clubs’ shirts with artists”. The new location of the festival was the lack of momentum, since they are mainly clubs in the Marvila and Beato areas.

“ We associated each of them with an artist, who entered the club world, knew history, spoke to the leaders. From this they made a proposal that for some clubs serves as ‘merchandise’, to sell and have a few extra change, and for others as equipment, to be used in competitions”, said António Brito Guterres, highlighting that this is also “a way to articulate stories, accelerate the history of the territory”.

The new club jerseys such as Chelas Football Club, the Eastern Club of Lisbon, the Musical Society 3 d’Agost of 1885 or the Orange Tower FC are presented on Saturday at 16:30 in a football game sponsored by Dutch player Edgar Davids, where a football created by Vhils will be revealed for the street football association of the former international, which represented clubs such as Ajax, Milan, Juventus and Barcelona.

The football game is just one of the many activities of the programming of the Iminente Festival, which takes place between today and Sunday, at the former Afonso Domingues Industrial School in Marvila, closed in 2010, because it is situated on the way to the project of the Third Cross over the Tagus, between Chelas and Barreiro, which would allow the passage of the high-speed train.

Over the four days, there will be more than 140 artists and bands that will perform on five stages, including DJ Premier, Ustad Fazel Sapand, AJULLIACOSTA, La Familia Gitana, Dead City, Sam The Kid (who, with Orchestra and Black Ear, will present the album “Beats Vol.1: Love”), Mind Da Gap, Micro, Dead Hand, in a show with accordionist João Barradas and visual artist Mariana Vilanova, Dino d’Santiago, Batida, Lena d’Água, La Familia Gitana, Gisela João, DJ Marfox and DJ Nigga Fox, Ana Lua Caiano, A Girl No and UN!DD, project that brings together Acácia Maior, Cachupa Psicadelica, Fidju Kitxora, Prétu and Scú Fitchadu.

The program also includes film sessions, conversations, dance performances and artistic installations, by Vhils, Halfstudio, 3D Crew, Wasted Rita, ±MaisLes±, Tamara Alves, Pedrita and Obey SKTR, among others.

Full programming can be found at www.festivaliminente.com.

Passes to the four days of the festival are exhausted. From today there are only daily tickets for sale.

The organization advises the use of public transport to reach the site.