Porta Entreaberta is a group exhibition at artist Francisca Valador‘s sun-house. The address itself, Travessa do Guarda-Jóias, heralds exquisite reflections, and the climb up to the Ajuda quarter confirms the lit-up height. Every window gives us a glimpse of the opaque, secure Tagus River, a new blue block. In the flying-house, magically prepared, there are works by artists Inês Brites, Leylâ Gediz, Sara Graça, Sara Mealha and Francisca Valador.

Stepping into this house is like visiting an exhibition with the access codes of a domestic setting, asking for the appropriate licences, while kicking off one’s shoes, to access a tragicomedy featuring mundane propositions apparently in tune with reality but, down to the last detail, are a radical subversion of it.

In the area corresponding to the Living Room, Francisca Valador punctuates time with the paintings Crescente and Minguante, pinpointing the rhythm of the Moon, which regulates tides, emotions, farming cycles and menstruation.

Sara Mealha’s Passeio, with the letter I painted on the wall four times, and Cama, a hiiiigh mini-bed, are succeeded by forbidden words that heighten desire. The letter I grows and repeats itself in the thrill of taking to the streets, in direct proportion to the height of the infiiiiiinite bed under the curse of a bad night’s rest. We sleep well after a walk, but do not say out loud, please, walk in front of the dog, bed in front of the child or insomnia in front of the adult.

Uma Lágrima e Outras Geometrias, by Inês Brites, ironically solves the great Western equation by stating that the emotional cannot fit into the orthogonal limits of architectural blueprints or institutional structures, whether public or private, reverting the hierarchy of forms to privilege unexpected fluidity. Next door, on the window overlooking the street, Isa vou-me embora, vinyl of a human figure, by Sara Graça, is a reminder of the boundaries of the House, agonising over the fact that this area is a place of not just arrival, but also, and always, departure. On the balcony, Francisca Valador wrenches our hearts with the work Sem par, in which a solitary sock has withered in an endless summer sun, already without its half-half, on a seductive blue railing.

The open heart is dealt with in the next area, the Room, with Três amores, an oil painting of three purple and white pansies, both fresh and weeping. On the opposite wall, Um cálculo delicado, by Inês Brites, is a direct, witty taunt to the formally triangular painting, apparent balancing professionals. The final delight is Pano Roxo, a bed frame, this time by Sara Graça, surrounded by a patchwork of found cloths, an emotional mishmash, September in a beach house or a sweetly freakish camper van.

The whole thing is extremely honest and, between the tears, giggles and projections sparked by the tricks and fiction, the Kitchen is where we revisit the concepts (from memory) towards the end of the day. Leylâ Gediz shows us some immaculate and simple white pastry bases, made of folded paper, from memory, a perishable proposal to restore the painting in the homonymous room, Neareastern, contradicting the chronological sequence of representation: the object exists when it is represented.

The text attached to the exhibition by Eva Oddo tells us about the “friendly shapes that collectively take flight and fall AND take flight again”. This is a particularly beautiful picture, expressing the spirit of a transparent and relationally enriching collective exhibition. When there is intimacy, there is also distance, glory and failure, paranoia, clearness, desire, friendship, and the collective is possible by enlightening all these aspects. Thank you, Francisca, for opening the door to your home with such honesty.

Porta Entreaberta can be visited until October 20.