This workshop was part of the artistic residency at CRL – Central Eléctrica in Porto, Portugal.
Through my research, I encountered the Monument to the Carquejeiras – a site that became an invitation for a radical exploration of the voice as a discipline.

Historically, the Carquejeiras were working-class women who carried heavy bundles of carqueja (a wild plant used as fuel) up the steep hills of Porto from the Douro River. Their labor sustained the city’s energy and warmth, yet their lives and voices were largely erased from dominant historical narratives. The monument, located at the top of one such hill, commemorates their strength, endurance, and resilience.

Inspired by their story, I opened a call for local, female-identified participants to give voice to the unspoken, based on my methodology ‘’How to perform a scream?’’ – echoing the silenced drama of these everyday heroines.

The participants engaged in various activities to unburden themselves using vocal tactics, imagination, drawing, and memory. The final outcome was a walking and vocal performance: climbing the same steep sidewalk from the coast of the Douro River up to the monument of the Carquejeiras. Through a combination of voice exercises, mini-monument clay making, Carqueja tea sessions, and performance exercises, we celebrated the sweetness of sustained female solidarity – carrying not firewood, but stories, screams, and breath.