“They convey to us – so much more than perfect pieces ever could – the power of the gesture of making. These are the pieces that remind us that once there is a first time, there can be many more.” Susana Moreira Marques, from Doing Good Fazer Bem Doing Well book.
Doing Well shown the fruits of these first months of labour of Fazer Bem Programme, in Carvalhal, an it was part of Terrafoundation Warm Up . To make these 37 handmade works happen, designers and two women artisans came together with a group of eight women participants from Grândola, Melides and Carvalhal, invited with the support of local institutions. For three weeks in a row the participants, who did not know each other, worked with the social designer Susana António and the craftswomen Cristina Fonseca and Dília Silva at the Parish Council of Carvalhall. The women received training in project design, strategic design, social design, communication design and in two specific types of handicraft, using bulrush and reed. In addition to the works they produced, they formed a community. From June to August 2023, with the coordination of Susana António, the workshops for these women continued to take place, in Grândola, once a week, in the house where the Senior University is located.
“While they work with their hands and talk to each other and sing, they don't know if it’s the material coming from nature that does them good. Or perhaps the thing that does them good is seeing this material take shape into a concrete object by applying collective knowledge and individual creativity. Or maybe it’s mainly the voices of the others that do them good. But they do know that these days they’ve spent together have already begun to make changes to their biographies. ” Susana Moreira Marques, from Doing Good Fazer Bem Doing Well.
Fazer Bem is also born as a program of innovation of craftsmanship. The exhibition features four pieces by designer Yves Béhar, which he made in pith of reed, bamboo and wool yarn. Béhar was born in Switzerland and now lives and works in the USA, and he developed these original pieces in collaboration with the artisan Cristina Fonseca and the creative hub A Avó Veio Trabalhar.
The book
Doing Good Fazer Bem Doing Well
Journalist and author Susana Moreira Marques weaves together the individual stories that make up the history of this first project; Austrian photographer Renate Graf’s original photo essay captures a glimpse of context, of raw materials, and of a place beyond time.
The numbered limited-edition print run of 1000 bilingual (English / Portuguese) copies are distributed in 69 countries in partnership with the Portuguese publisher AMAG.
You can buy it online at www.amagpublisher.com
The proceeds from the book’s sales will support the project Fazer Bem.