BORDALO II, Artist portrait

PLASTIC ROOSTER

Artur Bordalo (Lisboa, 1987) is today known as BORDALO II, the artistic name he chose as a tribute to his grandfather, promoting a continuity and reinvetion of his artistic legacy. His youth was spent in the company of his grandfather, the painter Real Bordalo and his incessant passion for watercolours, and his adventures around illegal graffiti in Lisbon’s underworld. He states that the eight years he spent at the Fine Arts Faculty of Lisbon allowed him to discover sculpture and the experimentation with various materials which distanced him from painting, the original art expression which lead him there in the first place.

Big Trash Animals

Big Trash Animals is a series of artworks that aims to draw attention to a current problem that is likely to be forgotten, be-come trivial or a necessary evil. The problem involves waste production, materials that are not reused, pollution and its effect on the planet.

The idea is to depict nature itself, in this case animals, out of materials that are responsible for its destruction. These works are built with end-of-life materials: the majority found in wastelands, abandoned factories or randomly and some are obtained from companies that are going through a recycling process.

Damaged bumpers, burnt garbage cans, tires and appliances are just some of the objects that can be identified when you go in to detail. They are camouflaging the result of our habits with little ecological and social awareness.

As part of his Big Trash Animals series, Bordalo II has designed a sculpture entitled, Plastic Rooster for the City of New Bedford. Phase one of the creation of the incoming Plastic Rooster, Metal/ Fabrication eleventh grade students from Greater New Bedford Vocational Technical High School are working directly with Bordalo’s Lisbon team to fabricate the skeletal structure of the artwork in preparation for Bordalo. This partnership in creating DATMA’s next semi-permanent sculpture for the city has been impactful and will prove to create a sense of pride for our community, aligning with the values in the Legend of the Rooster, an embodiment of the Portuguese love of life.

Explore more of Bordalo’s portfolio on his website HERE.

Mr. Stephen Flower’s Eleventh Grade Metal/ Fabrication Class at Greater New Bedford Voc Tech High
April 2024

And many thank you’s go to all the hard working welders in Mr. Flowers’s Metal/ Fab class including,;

Ryan Fernandes, Jamileishka Baez, Aissatou Sakho, Alexis Medeiros, Michael Perdomo, Luis Daniel Garcia, Emily Andre, Travis Peltier, Jason Sanders, Logan Edwards, Simone Chaplin, Luke Daivid Medeiros, Ariana Fernandes, Nylah Merkman, Sarah Renovato, Alden Reimels, Owen Doherty, Aiden Mastera, Robert Driscoll, Jacob Demers, Jacob Demers with special thanks to Mr. Stephen Flowers and Mr. Joel Gonzalez.