A Fala das Cabras e dos Pastores

As part of Equinozio, we host at Voce a sound installation by Portuguese artist Alexandre Delmar, which focuses on forms of sonic communication between shepherds and goats in different regions of Portugal. Through the collection and mapping of calls, vocalizations, and voice modulations, the project builds an archive of sounds developed over time through the daily practice of shepherding. Since 2015, Delmar has been recording and documenting these interactions in various rural areas of the country, seeking to identify a shared language between different species. This work questions the deeply rooted idea that language is an exclusively human prerogative: the shepherds’ calls are not simply commands addressed to animals, but part of a relationship built over time, based on mutual listening, repetition, and adaptation. The project invites us to reconsider the role of listening not only as an aesthetic experience, but as a practice of attention toward other forms of life with which we share the same space.