Aurélia de Souza 1866-1922 Life and Secret

The exhibition commemorated one of the most significant women in the Portuguese art world, with a remarkable life spanning the late 19th and early 20th century. Having started her artistic training at the Porto Academy of Fine Arts, she boldly travelled to Paris, where she met the most renowned artists of her time.
As the Soares dos Reis National Museum has a significant number of the artist’s works in its collection, the exhibition branched out to include works from other public and private collections, providing a wider presentation of Aurélia de Souza’s work.
Life and Secret Aurélia de Souza 1866-1922 had four major themes: Lives (portraits); Spaces (intimacy); Themes (plurality of genres) and Colours (self-portraits and self-representations). In the words of the curator, Maria João Lello Ortigão de Oliveira, “They encompass, within the physical limits of a museum space, the visible world of a woman artist as radical as she was secret”.

The MNSR has a calendar of visits to the exhibition that take place on Saturday mornings and afternoons, activities for families and conversations around topics related to Aurélia de Souza.
The exhibition was part of a commemorative programme especially prepared by a set of entities to mark the first centenary of Aurélia de Souza’s death, seeking to enhance and disseminate knowledge about her life and, above all, her work.
The exhibition has the patronage support of the Fundação BPI La Caixa and the institutional support of the Círculo Dr. José de Figueiredo – Amigos do Museu Nacional Soares dos Reis.