For six years, artist duo QUARTO has been transporting a huge metal cube through different landscapes all over the world. It has followed and framed the duo wherever it has moved. Now the cube will come to the quay outside Nationalmuseum. In a performance QUARTO seeks to weave a quiet bridge with some of the museum’s sculptures.
Date and time
Saturday 23 August, 14:00–16:00 and Friday 29 August, 16:00–18:00
Subject to changes depending on the weather, since the performance takes place outdoors.
Location
On th quay (Strömkajen) outside the museum
Admission
Free
QUARTO, Moving landsapes. Photo: Claudio von Planta
QUARTO, Moving landsapes. Photo: Claudio von Planta
QUARTO, Moving landsapes. Photo Thomas Rickenmann
About the event
QUARTO, consisting of Leandro Zappala and Anna af Sillén de Mesquita, choose to perceive the Cube as a topos — a site for dwelling, for situating themselves within space. They do not perceive it as a symbol of solidity or permanence, but a vessel in flux, echoing the Brazilian favela: improvised, communal, endlessly shifting. What matters is not its monumentality, but its emptiness — an invisible invitation to move, to transform, to activate.
In this performance, on the quay outside Nationalmuseum, QUARTO seeks to weave a quiet bridge with some of the museum’s sculptures.
It is not a gesture of reactivating, representing, or translating these sculptures, rather approaching them as traces, as embodied memories that QUARTO can navigate and move through. An intimate and unresolved gesture that will unfold and be further developed 2026.
The performance is a collaboration between QUARTO, Weld and Nationalmuseum
Coreography, concept and performance
Leandro Zappala and Anna af Sillén de Mesquita
Sound design
Philippe Boix Vives
Technical coordinator
Tobias Hallgren (Lumination of Sweden)
Co-produktion
Weld
Developed under collaboration and residence at: Dansens Hus, MDT, (Sweden), Breaking Walls Festival Cairo (Egypt), ZONA & Festival (Romania), Art Safiental Biennale (Schweiz) & Art Stations Foundation, Susch Museum (Schweiz) and Serralves Museum (Portugal).
Supported by The Swedish Arts Council and The Swedish Arts Grants Committee.
More about QUARTO
QUARTO is an interdisciplinary artist duo founded in 2003 by the choreographers Anna af Sillén de Mesquita and Leandro Zappala. Their work is deeply rooted in the interplay between theory and practice, exploring the boundaries between body and object through radical, visual and physical experiences. Known for their immersive and thought-provoking nature, QUARTO's works invite the audience to engage with social, political or existential issues through artistic interventions and innovations. QUARTO's work has been shown in many relevant international museums, venues and festivals in over 25 countries. In 2018 QUARTO was awarded the Birgit Cullberg grant, in recognition of their significant contribution to the contemporary performing arts.