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Monument to the Discoveries (Intervention)
Photograph illustrating the news story about the ‘vandalism’ of the ‘Discoveries’ monument in Lisbon by a foreigner passing through Portugal.
The monument, erected in 1940 for the Portuguese World Exhibition, is still one of the most important and most visited monuments in Portugal. On 8 August 2021, the monument dawned with graffiti that read ‘Blindly sailing for monney [sic], humanity is drowning in a scarllet [sic] sea lia [sic]’, or, loosely translated: ‘Sailing blindly for money, humanity is sinking in a scarlet sea’.
The news immediately labelled the act ‘vandalism’, placing the popular demonstration and the questioning of the presence of these colonial vestiges in the public space in a place of devaluation. This act raised a huge public discussion not only about the presence of these monuments, but also about the type of initiatives that should be taken in front of them. This whole movement is also a repercussion of the BLM movements.