CHAIA is a research and development unit dedicated to the production and dissemination of knowledge in the areas of Arts, Humanities, and Cultural Heritage. Therefore, it brings together researchers, artists, and creators from different scientific and artistic fields, distributed across various research groups:
Archeology *
The Archaeology research line brings together specialists in prehistoric and Roman archaeology from the southern Iberian Peninsula, focusing on megalithic culture, rock art, Roman settlements, and ancient landscapes; it combines field research (excavations and non-invasive methods) with material analysis and digital technologies to document, interpret, and reconstruct past contexts. In addition to scientific research, the group develops projects to promote archaeological heritage as a strategic resource for inland regions, fostering connections between heritage, communities, and sustainable development. In collaboration with public entities, museums, and local governments, researchers work in the areas of preservation, conservation, and enhancement of cultural heritage; community participation in identity-building processes; the application of digital technologies to safeguard memory; and the study of traditional landscapes and construction techniques with potential for contemporary environmental sustainability. The group also provides advanced scientific support for doctoral training in Archaeology.
Full Researchers *
Gertrudes Branco
Jorge de Oliveira
Leonor Rocha (Coordinator)
Nelson Carvalho Almeida
Nelson Oliveira Almeida
Architecture
The Architecture research line develops critical and interdisciplinary research on architecture, city, territory, and heritage, articulating theory, design practice, and technological innovation. It distinguishes itself through research dedicated to the study and valorization of modern architectural heritage, with special emphasis on the work of Álvaro Siza Vieira, promoting public awareness of its cultural and patrimonial relevance.
Simultaneously, it develops research on the recovery of materials, construction techniques, and traditional architectural typologies, exploring their potential for climate efficiency and sustainability in contemporary architecture through the adaptation of historical buildings to new uses, contributing to the preservation and revitalization of built heritage.
Through a strong articulation between design, research, and advanced training, it promotes the design experiment as an instrument of critical reflection and innovation, especially within the scope of the doctoral program in Architecture. Activities also encompass community participation in heritage valorization processes, the application of digital technologies in the preservation of memory and heritage, and the promotion of climate sustainability through architecture and urban design.
Visual Arts
The Visual Arts Research Group (GIAV) is characterized by artistic practice as a methodology for knowledge production, articulating contemporary creation, cultural criticism, and experimentation through projects that explore the transformative role of the arts in three main areas:
- Social and Participatory Arts — promotes, through co-creation and collaboration between communities, artists, and organizations, social integration and transformation, economic sustainability, and awareness of problems of discrimination and exclusion, involving groups such as immigrants, the elderly, or survivors of domestic violence.
- Art, Memory, and Post-memory — explores the role of art in reflecting on lived and inherited memories, investigating identities, cultures, conflicts, resistance, and trauma. Through the preservation and reinterpretation of tangible and intangible heritage, it recreates traditions, knowledge, and cultural imaginaries, preventing their disappearance and producing new meanings about the world.
- Art, Technology and Thought — is dedicated to investigating technologies, concepts and languages in contemporary art through artistic creation, promoting transdisciplinary dialogues about the role of art and technology in today’s society. Among the topics covered are Artificial Intelligence, immersive and interactive technologies, and the preservation of traditional technical knowledge.
Design
The Design research line develops applied and transdisciplinary research focused on contemporary challenges of sustainability and regeneration, innovation, and cultural, digital, and social transformation. It is structured around the articulation between Product Design and Communication Design, promoting systemic approaches that integrate environment, society, economy, and culture through collaborative methodologies and co-creation processes involving communities, institutions, and strategic stakeholders.
The line promotes the integration of research, teaching, and knowledge transfer, encouraging national and international collaboration networks and fostering closer ties between academia, business, cultural institutions, and civil society. The line thus assumes design as an expanded field of research and critical action, capable of responding ethically, innovatively, and transformatively to the complexity of emerging contemporary challenges.
Full Researchers
Theatre and Performance Studies
The Theatre and Performance Studies line of research focuses on the potential of performing arts as instruments for critical reflection, social awareness, and heritage appreciation, highlighting the relationship between performing arts, community, and territory. It investigates performative and participatory practices that articulate artistic creation, research, and community intervention, with a special focus on community theatre, puppet theatre, and participatory methodologies aimed at promoting social cohesion, intergenerational justice, and inclusion.
Its research explores theatre and performativity as means of raising awareness about issues of environmental sustainability, climate crisis, and social discrimination, as well as forms of preservation, interpretation, and appreciation of heritage. Simultaneously, it develops theoretical and critical reflections on theatre and performativity as fields of artistic research, also promoting debate around collective memory and post-memory.
History of Art
The research line in Art History is dedicated to the study and appreciation of tangible and digital heritage, developing urban virtual recreation projects that use digital technologies to preserve, interpret, and communicate lost historical realities; it promotes theoretical research on heritage and the notion of “creative conservation,” integrating art history, conservation, and artistic practices to recover memories and contemporary collections.
It also works in specialized areas—tile art, miniature portraiture, 16th-17th century Portuguese painting, and paper and photograph conservation—and focuses on interdisciplinarity and community participation for the classification, conservation, and dissemination of heritage, in addition to providing scientific support for doctoral training in Art History. The line prioritizes critical and transversal approaches, promoting dialogue between historiography, curatorship, conservation, archives, and current artistic practices, frequently in conjunction with museums and international research networks.
Landscape
Starting from the operational concept of landscape – understood as an architecture resulting from a dynamic, evolving system in time and space, where complex natural, ecological, cultural, economic, and emotional systems intersect – our research seeks to contribute to the definition of public policies for the design, management, and conservation of the landscape.
In this context, the representation of the landscape is affirmed as a fundamental tool for reading and experimentation, where art and science intersect. Functioning as a mirror of humanity’s relationship – in its economic, social, ethical, and aesthetic aspects – with natural systems, living or inert, landscape research, based on the ecological, cultural, historical, and aesthetic dimensions, opens new paths for policies and practices of heritage management and conservation.
Heritage, often viewed as a static reality, acquires, in its landscape extension, a dimension of transformation and evolution that defines its own ontology: a materiality in constant becoming, where the present is simultaneously past and future. This perspective forms the core of our research, both in (re)defining the concept of heritage and in innovating the practices of its management, conservation and maintenance, as well as serving as a laboratory for the future.
* Existing research group and associated researchers until 2025