Almost Irresponsible

Almost Irresponsible

As in every year since 2018, the partnership established with the Instituto de Produção Cultural e Imagem (IPCI) is renewed, reinforcing our commitment to authors from our context who are at the beginning of their careers. The works of Raquel Calviño, José Alves, Miguel Vieira Pinto, Ana Rego, Inês Fernandes, Adriano Pimenta, André Rodrigues, Joana Dionísio, and Joana Matos, all of whom are recent graduates of the Master’s in Artistic Photography, were showcased as part of the festival.

Bernardo Guedes’ exhibition “Quase Irresponsável” invites us to explore a youth lived between euphoria and introspection, captured through a lens that reveals both the brightness and the shadows of nightlife. Guedes’ photographs are snapshot fragments of a time that slips away, where responsibilities are almost neglected, but not completely forgotten. These images, taken in the last years of his academic career, bear witness to a phase in which the author balances on the fine line between youthful freedom and the inevitability of adult responsibilities.

Bernardo’s photographic approach evokes the style of the legendary Weegee, the American photographer known for capturing unexpected and sometimes shocking scenes of urban life. Like Weegee, Guedes uses black and white to intensify contrasts, resorting to peculiar framing that amplifies the sense of urgency and the fleetingness of the moment. The use of direct flash, as in Weegee, is not just a technical choice, but an artistic statement that highlights what is normally tried to be hidden, offering a raw and honest look at reality.

Each composition, although unpretentious and almost improvised, carries a depth that transports us to the whirlwind of emotions and sensations that marked the artist’s youth. In each photograph, you feel the rush of time, the ephemerality of experiences and the paradox of a momentary immortality, where the present is lived with intensity, but the future begins to creep in with its inevitable demands.

“Quase Irresponsável” is an invitation to reflect on the tension between the desire for freedom and accepting the responsibilities that mark the transition to adulthood. It is a poetic and, at the same time, brutally real portrait of a phase of life where immortality seems possible, even if it is only a passing illusion.

CAAA — Centro para os Assuntos da Arte e da Arquitetura
R. Padre Augusto Borges de Sá, 4810-523 Guimarães

Opening Hours:

Monday – Friday
14:30–18:30

Saturday
15:00–19:00

Sunday
Closed