Campo Grande, Metro de Lisboa 

Curator: Right, so before we rush off, let’s spend some time appreciating this striking panel. It's called 'Campo Grande, Metro de Lisboa,' by Eduardo Nery. It's part of a much larger series of tile murals located in the Campo Grande metro station in Lisbon. Editor: Wow, my first thought is a slightly disorienting elegance! The repeated image, fragmented and shifted across the grid, almost makes the figure seem to vibrate. Is it supposed to feel like a snapshot taken on a moving train, perhaps? Curator: Precisely! Nery’s use of traditional blue and white Portuguese ‘azulejo’ tiles combined with that fragmented, almost cinematic effect is pretty genius. It bridges the old and the new, hinting at movement, time, and the layered history of the city. Editor: Layered history is right. Tile work is rarely *just* decoration here, is it? It's connected with centuries of colonial trade, wealth appropriation, and, in more contemporary installations like this, ideas of public art. In what other ways might Nery play with that history? Curator: In really cheeky ways, I think. That central figure almost feels like a ghost of Lisbon’s past emerging, a conquistador maybe, fragmented across the present. Are those multiple images suggesting the rapid growth or the displacement occurring in cities, perhaps even hinting at anxieties surrounding progress. Editor: Yes! We need to think of urban spaces as not only places of progress but also displacement, both social and psychological. This disruption really is beautiful to contemplate on our journey. I think I get why Nery adopted it. Curator: And now that we’re hopefully slightly more historically attuned to the artist's visual story, it will surely set you up perfectly to explore Lisbon, on wheels or foot, hopefully less as tourists, more as people attuned to the multi-faceted aspects that construct city life, so on with our urban wandering now? Editor: Indeed, a thoughtful contemplation for our ride, lets go see how else those past imprints, for better or worse, structure the architecture.