Rua das Farinhas,

Lisboa 9.12.15 16h

Nathalie Mansoux is a French Director living in Lisbon;
She studied history and anthropology and her first documentary was created after one year's field research in Mexico.
She likes to spend time observing what surrounds her and with her work she aims to give voice to who is not heard and to the problems of social reality.

I propose to Nathalie to meet because of her work “Via de Acesso”,
a documentary from 2008 witnessing the situation of Azinhaga dos Besouros, a district in Lisbon suburb demolished to make space for the construction of a new highway.
The movie describes with sensibility and humanity the situation of people who, not registered in the census, have no legal right to be included in the “Special Re-housing Plan” and witness day by day the demolition of their houses.

Nathalie describes some moments of her work in Azinhaga, and explains then her personal relation with her own House, with the neighborhood; her idea of the meaning of “feeling Home”.
“Feeling home is the harmony with what is around” says Nathalie while denouncing the touristic transformation of the city of Lisbon, the new commercial relationship the city establishes with its inhabitants, and the loss of neighborhood life.

At the moment she is working on three new projects and she anticipates a little bit of their content.
The first work is about the Music School of Conservatorio National, about music education and transmission.

It wants to be “a tribute to the beauty and to the rigor of teaching”.
The second focuses on the space of Patio Dom Fradique and on the touristic transformation of the district where it is located (and where the same Nathalie lives), and the third, developed in collaboration with a friend, will be a three episode film about Portugues Slaves Trade…
 

...to listen is to imagine...

Thank you Nathalie, for your time, and your voice, that in those days was hardly coming out, because of a long cold!

Good listening!

SPACE:

This interview recording took place in a 16 square meter room where the ceiling is not too high.

The room is a private space, furnished in a minimalist way so that the sound is not too dry for a voice, but it would be too loud for an instrument.
The space has a wooden floor, it is well insulated, and the thick walls and new windows minimize(even if not avoid completely)the sounds coming from the street.

It is located on a third floor of a building in Mouraria, one of the historical districts of the city of Lisbon.