CHAMADA ABERTA | "EXPLORAR REALIDADES CONTEMPORÂNEAS” 
PT/ENG
Com esta Chamada Aberta "Explorar Realidades Contemporâneas", lançamos o grande tema de interesse anual da scopio Magazine AAI - Exploring Contemporary Realities, Volume 2, e iniciamos uma nova colaboração com o projeto Contrast: Rede multidisciplinar de iniciativas artísticas em Arte, Arquitetura, Design e Fotografia através da Conferência Internacional SCOPIO & CONTRAST.
A chamada terá como editores responsáveis académicos/artistas provenientes tanto da revista scopio AAI, bem como do projeto Contrast. Esta equipa editorial assegurará o necessário trabalho de peer review através da plataforma OJS da U. Porto.
A scopio Magazine AAI será, desta forma, o periódico académico oficial da Conferência Internacional SCOPIO & CONTRAST e as submissões são tanto para a Conferência como para o seu 2º volume em parceria com o Contrast, abordando o tema Explorando Realidades Contemporâneas.
Scopio Magazine AAI is transitioning to continuous publication to  better align with the dynamics of Open Access electronic publishing,  moving away from the constraints of its previous model geared towards  traditional print formats. This shift aims to expedite the dissemination  of research to the community, offering immediate benefits to both  readers and authors by ensuring quicker access to new findings. The  adoption of a continuous publication strategy enhances the open review  process by reducing the time from submission to publication and by  boosting the visibility of individual contributions, thus fostering  greater engagement and dissemination within the scholarly community.
The present call aims to explore the use of photography and other  means of visual representation as forms of artistic research,  documentation, and analysis of different configurations on the  transformation of the physical environment and how it is understood and  shaped by a diverse field of study, practices and cultures. This means,  besides other things, to better understand through photography and film  the relationship between culture and space and explore how culture,  beliefs, behaviours, and practices, interacts with and shape the  physical environment of different territories and their architectures,  cities and landscapes, as well as to acknowledge contemporary discourses  and usages of landscape concepts[1].
Social transformations are linked to changes in the inhabited place,  and recent history has revealed the speed with which space changes.  These transformations have been so radical that regular documentation  about the impermanence of the place has become urgent. In fact, places  are uncertain spaces and to represent them visually is to preserve their  understanding, recent life experiences such as the gentrification of  large cities or the health crisis have imposed profound changes on  contemporary life models and, consequently, allowed the creation of  previously unthinkable photographs. This is where the “Exploring  contemporary realities” is located, artistic projects and documentary  projects that operate from the expanded field of architecture, art and  design from its actual materialization to the experiences of the place;  exploring different levels of privacy, scales and urban landscapes.  Focusing also on the exploration of the discursive space that operates  in broader systems: sociocultural, political, historical and even  technical.
If we accept the image as a kind of visual language2  , disseminated and received in different geographic points, this call  extends this dialogue, opening up to the integration of different looks  of cultural identities from other regions, places and countries; the  specificity of the place as a way to increase our understanding of  society and the territory. The objective is to encourage the use of  images for the construction of artistic projects that promote critical  views on the transformation of the physical environment as a result of  the way they are perceived and experienced in their multiple facets. In  summary, the aim is to take advantage of the current role of the image  as a way of expanding knowledge with a particular focus on photography,  recognized as a privileged means of expression and research for the  understanding of architecture and urban landscapes and for the  construction of the imaginary; between document and fiction;  reproduction and manipulation; analogue and digital visual  representation as a means of crossing different disciplines, blurring  artistic boundaries.
The call is interested in the construction of artistic projects and  theoretical essays using photography and film as a way of communicating  the experience of space, questioning how people live and work, as well  as architectural practices and urban landscapes. We want to encourage  students and researchers to develop projects that are not limited to  documenting and describing reality, but to deepen knowledge that enhance  the construction of more effective and meaningful ways of understanding  our relationships with the territory, even anticipating a possible  future. It is intended to develop visual essays based on conceptually  and artistically strong photographic artistic practices.
We are open to submissions that explore photographic representation  as an artistic research tool, both in theoretical work and in field  work, in all its possible and complex artistic visions. We want to  awaken the interest of authors in the areas of architecture, art and  design encouraging the creation of photographic series that explore new  frontier paradigms, which can contribute to the critical analysis of the  dynamics of physical and social transformation, understanding  architecture and urban landscape as living and inclusive organisms.
The organization of the international conference will integrate  members coming from scopio Magazine AAI Editorial team and the Contrast  project, reinforcing in this way the network of multidisciplinary  artistic initiatives in Art, Architecture, Design and Photography.
Abstracts for conference presentation will be published in the e-book  of abstracts of the SCOPIO & CONTRAST International Conference,  which will have also the program and will be accessible and free to  download through scopio Magazine AAI and Contrast platforms at the time  of the event.
Subsequent publication of the most relevant (expanded – full  manuscripts) contributions will be published in section Exploring  Contemporary Realities | Open Call of scopio Magazine AAI ], Volume 2.
 
ORGANIZING COMMITTEE
scopio Magazine AAI
Research group AAI (FAUP) integrated in the I&D centre of FAUP  (CEAU) and the Centre for English, Translation and Anglo-Portuguese  Studies of the Faculdade de Letras da Universidade do Porto (CETAPS/FLUP), i2ADS  – Institute of Research in Art, Design and Society is a R&D unit  based at the Faculty of Fine Arts of the University of Porto (FBAUP),  Research Institute for Design, Media and Culture [ID+] and the  Institute Arquitecture and Development (Arq.ID) based at University  Lusófona of Porto, counting with the institutional support of U.Porto’s Rectorate and in partnership with AEFAUP, counting with the support of other Student Associations of U.Porto.
Contrast project
The team of this project counts on the solid experience ofseveral  higher education institutions – ARCO, DARQ, DCAM, EA.UCP, ESAP, ESMAD, FAUP, FBAUL, FBAUP, FEUP, IPT e UL.CUP – that through several projects, research and  initiatives, ensure a strong integrated and complementary strategy of  teaching, research and communication.
The project has a joint coordination in partnership with the Cultural  Association Cityscopio, ESMAD-uniMAD andFBAUP – i2ADS, and is led by  FAUP through the research group Architecture, Art and Image (AAI)  integrated in theCentre for the Study of Architecture and Urbanism  (CEAU), being funded by DGARTES contest to support projects of creation  and edition, through the Cultural Association Cityscopio.
 
Integrated program to conference
The Contrast RC Exhibition “Exploring Contemporary Realities”
The exhibition is the result of a selection of photographic works by  students and emerging authors made in the context of teaching at the  various institutions involved in the project, "while at the same time  allowing students to explain their projects, as well as observe their  photographic works both in book format and on the online platforms of  Contrast and of Society of Artistic Research Research Catalog (RC)",  using a Mobile Projector for projecting the exhibition in diverse rooms  and auditoriums.
The RC allowed to create custom designed webpages used for the  exhibition containing many types of media including: text, video,  images, and audio recordings. The way in which these materials are  presented was customizable by the authors and curators exploring the  possibilities of collaboration with multiple authors on the development  of the exhibition.
The exhibition aims to contribute to the dissemination of photography  in its interaction with Art, Architecture and Design. This contribution  will be developed at national and international level through the  sharing of experiences and knowledge between schools, groups and  non-academic associations, bringing together the interest of different  audiences in these themes from a transversal and holistic perspective.
The contents of the exhibition will also be online and the exhibition  experience is registered purely for research purposes, being analysed  in the context of the ongoing Contrast project.
 
Author GuidelinesSubmissions of abstracts for conference
Login or Register to make a submission.
Instructions
To submit your abstract proposal, please send a 400 – 500 words text  (including title, references and a maximum of five images) and a short  bio for author’s (up to 70 words each) and name, title, affiliation,  pronouns, email, phone, and address until 1st of November 2024.
All presentations must be in English and should take no more than 15 minutes to present. Please indicate the number of panellists to participate in your presentation.
                                              
Abstracts for conference presentation will be published in the e-book of abstracts  of the SCOPIO & CONTRAST International Conference, which will have  also the program and will be accessible and free to download through  scopio Magazine AAI and Contrast platforms at the time of the event.
Abstracts and manuscript drafts of the entries considered most relevant (expanded – full manuscripts)  contributions will be invited to published in scopio Magazine AAI -  Exploring contemporary realities, Volume 2 and for that purpose will be  further reviewed to deliver a 2nd final manuscript.
Publication date (tbc): by December 2024
 
Some issues of interest that can be taken on board when answering this call are the following:
- How photography and film can be used for communicating contemporary realities and the way architecture, landscape and city forms relate with public spaces and their contemporary appropriation; 
- What photography and film tell us about the world we inhabit and can be used as a creative process that brings to light new ways of understanding architecture and landscape realities in contemporary urban space, as well as document their cultural significance and heritage values; 
- How photography and film can be used to confront present architectural programs, planning  and public spaces; 
- How photography and film may set forward the idea of a new understanding of architecture, changing our on-site perception and even turning it into a projected vision in space 
- The uses of photography and film in identifying, recording and 'unlocking' sites of transformation – i.e. buildings, landscapes, and places, which are undergoing, or will undergo, a process of renewal 
- Photographic and filmic series that focus on the perceptive, sensorial and affective experience of architecture and landscape in the urban and rural context.  
Accepted submissions engage with the issues above in the form of full papers, short papers or visual essays. 
[1]  See the discussion of key conceptions of landscape circulating as part  of the recent discourse i.e.  landscape as a fundamental building block,  a communicative medium, and a realm of imaginative constructs." Vera  Vicenzotti. "The Landscape of Landscape Urbanism." Landscape Journal 36, no. 1 (2018): 75-86. https://lj.uwpress.org/content/36/1/75
[2] Nathan Jurgenson - The Social Photo: On Photography and Social Media, Verso, 2019, p. 13-14
Mais informação em: 
scopio Magazine AAI: https://www.up.pt/revistas/index.php/scopio/announcement/view/33 
CONTRAST: https://contrast.arq.up.pt/en/news/open-call-exploring-contemporary-realities/
SIGARRA / FAUP:  https://sigarra.up.pt/faup/pt/noticias_geral.ver_noticia?p_nr=81962 
 
 Research group:  Architecture, Arte and Image — AAI CEAU.FAUP