Invention of Thinking is a performance, conversation, soliloquy, between the artist and a brain coral. A hermaphroditic species, brain corals have reproductive cells for both sexes in the same individual. In the process of reproduction, external fertilisation occurs in which the gametes are dispersed synchronously in the water. The larvae then develop into the planktonic form of cnidarians (polyps), which are carried by currents and tides until they settle on the substrate or are preyed upon by other organisms.
Photos: Nuno Coelho
António Poppe is a poet, visual artist and performer who lives and works in Lisbon.
He graduated in Zoo-technology, completed the advanced visual arts course at Ar.Co, in Lisbon, and studied drawing and sculpture at the Royal College of Arts, London. He completed a master's degree in Performing Art and Cinema at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, with a scholarship from the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation and the Luso American Development Foundation. He is the author of a hybrid work between the visual arts, performance and poetry, which he has presented since 1996 in various cultural institutions and galleries such as the Serralves Museum, MAAT, Culturgest, Gulbenkian, Carmona e Costa Foundation, Soares dos Reis Museum, ZDB Gallery, 111 Gallery, Casa Fernando Pessoa, GIAJG, among others. He has published five books: Torre de Juan Abad (Assírio e Alvim), Livro da Luz (Documenta), Medicin (Douda Correria), Come Coral (Douda Correria), O Agitador e a Corrente (written with Mumtazz and published by Mariposa Azual).