“We are gathered today around our common language, but it is also the culture, history and economy that make us want to reinforce the ties that unite these two autonomous communities”, said the President of the Legislative Assembly of the Autonomous Region of the Azores, Ana Luís, at the opening session of the exhibition “56 Páxinas das Nosas Letras”, which took place last 19 October at the Casa dos Açores in Lisbon.
The goal of the institutional cooperation between the Parliaments of the two European regions that share the origin of their language, the relation with the Atlantic and also the autonomous condition is to strengthen the bounds between the Azores and Galicia. In this sense, the Legislative Assembly of the Autonomous Region of the Azores and the Parliament of Galicia have been organising a joint event since 2016 in order to reinforce the identity of these regions through the cultural diversity in Europe.
This year, the event included the opening of two travelling exhibitions and a tasting of Azorean and Galician products. The event started at Casa dos Açores in Lisbon with the opening of the travelling exhibition “56 Páxinas das Nosas Letras”, a result from the annual celebration of the Galician Literature Day, organised by the Parliament and the Government of Galicia and the Real Academia Galega aiming at divulging the work by notorious personalities in the Galician literary field or by the defence of the Galician language.
The ceremony continued at the Xuventude de Galicia – Centro Galego de Lisboa, with the opening of the travelling exhibition from the Legislative Assembly “Açores: Silêncio e Ser”, a photographic exhibition that presents the interpretation of the photographer Jorge Barros on the novel “Ilhas Desconhecidas” by Raul Brandão and with the intervention of Professor Urbano Bettencourt about the writer. At the occasion, Ana Luís showed her gratitude towards the collaboration and welcoming of both institutions, highlighting that “this celebration is made by those who are farther, by those who, for any reason, did not return home and feel “their island” in a more special way”.
Horta, 22 October 2018