In Portuguese the word “borda” is derived from the verb “bordar”, embroider, which means to enrich, to decorate, to enhance, to elaborate. It stands next to the other meaning of this word: border, fringe, boundary, verge, margin, threshold, limit, barrier, frontier. There are geographic and political borders, sometimes represented by walls, barbed wire, hedges, check points and gates. It can be an in-between place for no one and for everyone, for those who arrive, those who leave and those who linger. Here and there, the beginning and the end, somewhere and nowhere. Who is allowed to cross? Who stays? Who will be kept out? Who belongs and who doesn’t? Who has the right to exist? Territories can also be demarcated by nomadic movements and a mixture of elements, physical and symbolic: specific cultural identities, scents, sounds, language, rituals, distinct survival strategies and knowledge, ways of managing forests and plants. How can we work from a reality intertwined with visible and invisible lines, that mark the boundaries between fear and hope, between noise and quietness, flood and fire. How can we bring with us the land of our visions, desires, memories and futures? Perhaps by patiently and laboriously weaving together a porous place of fluid alterity, an embroidery where margins move, float and dance. — Lia Rodrigues