The designation given to a set of three recently remodelled exhibition rooms located on the ground floor of the Palace of Viscondes de Balsemão. In this space, that has an extended programmatic framework, various exhibition projects, designed in partnership or in co-production with different structures, are shown.

Its vocation is to present authorial universes dedicated exclusively or primarily to the thought-practice of drawing. The Cabinet presents works by artists of several generations united by the erratic or systematic practice of drawing, understood as a way of designing and imagining. We look for contiguities, affinities, understandings, resonances and circulations, often unsuspected, among radically idiosyncratic authorial universes, sometimes distant in time and place. 

This programme is dedicated to thinking about and translating the city as a huge archive, a living and dynamic repository, formed by documents – written, visual or audible, graphic or photographic – and other material items that compose or recompose a complex urban fabric, either in terms of temporality or spatiality.

Conceived as a space for listening and reading. It functions as an extension of the Sound Library - the beating heart of the Porto City Museum. The exhibition programme is based on the magnificent bibliographic background of Porto’s Municipal Public Library, a true Noah's ark in a world of ecological crisis and biodiversity loss. This collection seems to bring together human memories which have stimulated our amazing imaginary universe and elevated us spiritually.

Located in the Foyer of the Almeida Garrett Municipal Library, the Graphic Cabinet presents a programme of temporary exhibitions dedicated to Porto’s diverse and prolific ecosystem of graphic production. Indeed, the dynamics of graphic production, often organised within associations, guilds, cooperatives, civic or partisan groups, or artist collectives, maintains a strong presence in the city. The echoes of this critical spirit, often insurrectional and pamphleteering, characterise the culture of Porto and underpinned the strategy to spread the 1820 Liberal Revolution.