According to the curator, “the suggestion behind Sequeira’s choice to open a dialogue with the works of Teresa Gonçalves Lobo was to find in the work of both a similar sense of the plastic and metamorphic invention of drawing which, clearly experienced on its expressive plane, emphasises the possibility of spreading out over surfaces, making the choreography of countless lines vibrate as a way of suggesting the presence of forms which, although unrecognisable in a figurative mode, nevertheless function as forms of a figuration.”

Teresa Gonçalves Lobo (Funchal, 1968), whose work began more than two decades ago, focused from the start on drawing as an expressive field where she has developed remarkable research. She is represented in various private and institutional collections in Portugal and abroad.

Domingos Sequeira (Lisbon, 1768 – Rome, 1837), considered by some to be the most talented and original Portuguese painter of his time, played a fundamental role in the development of Portuguese art in the early 19th century.

In the dialogue that supports this exhibition, we can see how a similar approach to drawing and the way of scratching occurs in the works of both artists, despite the long distance in time that separates them, but whose purpose of giving birth to the form of this use of risk brings them closer together.

Also on 25 January, the Museum opens the exhibition Landscape by José Zagalo Ilharco.

Assets classified as being of national interest, also known as National Treasures, represent cultural value of significance for history and collective memory. Their loss or degradation would mean irreparable damage to cultural heritage and collective memory.

The Soares dos Reis National Museum has a collection of 10 pieces classified as assets of national interest, also known as National Treasures. This classification is awarded to objects of indisputable national value due to their antiquity, authenticity, creativity, exemplarity, memory, originality, rarity or uniqueness.

List of National Treasures at the Museum

O Desterrado (The Exiled)
António Soares dos Reis (1847-1889)
1872
Carrara marble

Self-Portrait of Aurélia de Souza
Aurélia de Souza (1866-1922)
c. 1900
Oil on canvas

The White Houses of Capri
Henrique Pousão (1859-1884)
1882
Oil on canvas

Reliquary bust of St Pantaleon
Unknown artist
15th and 16th century
White, gilded and painted silver; enamels; gold, hyaline quartz

Episcopal Crosier
Antonio Arrighi (goldsmith)
1740
Cast silver, chiselled; gilded

Count of Ferreira
António Soares dos Reis (1847-1889)
1876
Original plaster

Window with Blue Shutters
Henrique Pousão (1859-1884)
1882-1883
Oil on wood

Lady in Black
Henrique Pousão (1859-1884)
1882
Oil on wood

Reliquary Cross and Cruet Set
Late 17^th / early 18^th century
Nephrite jade, gold, gilt silver, rubies and colourless glass [cross];
Nephrite jade, gold, gilt silver, blue glass, quartz, topaz (?) and colourless glass doublets, enamels [cruet set].

Pair of Bracelets
Late Atlantic Bronze / 1st Iron Age – 7th / 6th (end) centuries BC
Randomly found at Rocio de São Sebastião, Castro Verde, Portugal
Gold cast in lost-wax and rolled; incised decoration

In 2022, the “Tourism Oscars” had already awarded Porto the honours of “Best City Destination in Europe” and, in the global competition, “Best City Destination in the World”. It was also voted “Best European Destination for an Urban Getaway” in 2020.

The Soares dos Reis National Museum is delighted with yet another honour for Porto and is very pleased to note that the number of visitors confirms the tourist preference and appetite for the destination.

The Soares dos Reis National Museum ended 2023 with a total of 74,712 visitors, making it the second best year in the last decade in terms of public attendance. A figure only surpassed in 2016 (totalling 98,694 visitors), the year in which the Museum presented the temporary exhibition dedicated to Amadeo de Souza Cardoso, Porto – Lisbon, 2016 – 1916.

Opened on 13 April, and marking the museum’s full reopening after the refurbishment work, the Soares dos Reis National Museum’s long-term exhibition brings together the most important collection of 19th century Portuguese art. In total there are 1133 pieces that tell the history of the museum and art, spread over 27 galleries.

António Soares dos Reis

Patron of the Museum since 1911, António Soares dos Reis, considered one of the greatest Portuguese sculptors of the 19th century, was born on 14 October 1847 in Vila Nova de Gaia.

When he was just 14, he enrolled at the Academia Portuense de Belas Artes, where he won several prizes and commendations. In just a few years he had completed the course, winning 1st prize in drawing, architecture and sculpture.

At the age of 20 he became a state pensioner abroad. Between 1867 and 1870 he stayed in Paris as a pensioner, receiving lessons from Jouffroy, Yvon and Taine. In Paris he received several prizes for his work.

After a brief stay in Portugal, in 1871 he left for Rome, a decisive stage in his training. It was in Rome that he began work on O Desterrado (The Exiled) (1872), a work of classical inspiration, an essay in the transition to naturalism, which was awarded a prize at the General Fine Arts Exhibition in Madrid in 1881.

Returning to Porto in 1873 to devote himself to his artistic career, he collaborated in publications and chaired the Centro Artístico Portuense. From 1881, he taught sculpture at the Academia Portuense de Belas Artes, although he disagreed with the organisation of the teaching.

Soares dos Reis was admired by his contemporaries, received commissions, took part in competitions and exhibitions and designed public monuments. Illness and dissatisfaction led him to commit suicide in his studio in 1889.

As a student, he took part in the reconstruction work on the S. Bento Palace, directed by Ventura Terra, and in the production of the sculptural group A Pátria by Teixeira Lopes.

After completing his studies, he continued to collaborate in his master’s studio until, in 1907, he took part in and won the competition for a state pensioner abroad, with The Beggar’s Prison.

At this leading artistic and cultural centre, he studied, among other sculptors, with Mercié (1845-1916), socialised with other compatriot artists (such as the sculptors Costa Mota, Simões de Almeida and João da Silva and the painters Sousa Lopes, Acácio Lino and Amadeo Souza Cardoso), sculpted, exhibited and visited museums.

In 1908, his bust entitled Smile was awarded a prize at the Salon and he produced Ida for the dispensary, a sculptural ensemble in clay. He also sent works to the Exhibition of School Works at the Escola Portuense de Belas-Artes: Head of a Woman, Study in Nature, Head Drawn from Plaster and Mercury.

In 1909, in collaboration with his brother and architect Francisco de Oliveira Ferreira, he took part in the competition for the Monument to the Peninsular War, to be erected in Lisbon, with the winning project entitled Portuguese Aspirants. Winning this competition forced him to interrupt his scholarship. He then returned to Portugal (from December 1910 to January 1911).

In 1912, he worked on the construction of the workshop-house in Miramar (Vila Nova de Gaia), which he had designed himself, and where he lived and worked from 1913 onwards.

In 1930, he took part in the XXVII Exhibition of the National Society of Fine Arts, winning the second medal with the bronze O melhor sono da nossa vida, dedicated to mothers, a work that was placed in Viseu, the sculptor’s mother’s hometown.

In 1931, he won his first medal at the XXVIII Exhibition of the National Fine Arts Society.

Two years later, in 1933, the Monument to the Peninsular War was inaugurated and the sculptor was honoured with the rank of Commander of the Military Order of Santiago de Espada.

José de Oliveira Ferreira was a member of the Council of Art and Archaeology of the North of Portugal.

He died in Miramar, Vila Nova de Gaia, on 3 October 1942.

With a history of almost 200 years, the Soares dos Reis National Museum – the first public art museum in the country – has been repositioning itself, now taking a new look at its collections.

The long-term exhibition presents a journey with two complementary narratives. The first reflects the history of the Museum and the way the collections have been integrated; the second emphasises the artists and their works.

About the Soares dos Reis National Museum
The Soares dos Reis National Museum has its origins in the Museum of Paintings and Prints and other Fine Arts objects, created in 1833 by Pedro IV of Portugal, the first Emperor of Brazil, to safeguard the assets sequestered from the absolutists and convents abandoned during the civil war (1832-34).

With the extinction of the religious orders, artworks were collected, among others, from the monasteries of Tibães and Santa Cruz de Coimbra. Known as the Museu Portuense, it was housed in the now-defunct Convent of Santo António da Cidade, in Praça de S. Lázaro, and was formalised by decree in 1836 by King Maria II.

In 1839, it passed to the direction of the Academia Portuense de Belas Artes, which organised a series of exhibitions in which notable artists such as Soares dos Reis, Silva Porto, Marques de Oliveira and Henrique Pousão were honoured, in successive generations of masters and disciples.

With the proclamation of the Republic, it was renamed the Soares dos Reis Museum in memory of one of the most outstanding names in Portuguese art. In 1932, it was renamed the National Museum, a period marked by a significant reorganisation by Vasco Valente, through the incorporation of objects from the Episcopal Palace of Porto (Mitra) and the Industrial Museum, as well as the deposit of collections from the now-defunct Municipal Museum. This was followed, in 1940, by the installation of the Museum in the Carrancas Palace, where it still remains.

The Soares dos Reis National Museum’s support for contemporary art in the city of Porto is perpetuated in the deposit of around a hundred works, acquired during the five-year period of operation of the Contemporary Art Centre, in what would become the current Serralves Foundation.

The programme under the motto Freedom and Transgressions will be complemented by guided tours, talks, workshops, concerts and conferences.

The Education Department will establish institutional partnerships as a way of implementing education and mediation programmes and projects. An example of this is the “Family Sunday at the Museum” programme which, with the participation of external entities, allows families to enjoy activities every Sunday of the year that include workshops, music, writing, performances and theatre, and to create connections with the different artworks and the Museum.

Courses and artist residencies are also a focus for 2024, as are programmes and projects for and with schools. Of particular note is the Art and Sustainability Programme, which consists of a series of workshops using the creative and conscious reuse of various materials. The programme marks the Museum’s contribution to the UN’s 2030 Agenda and the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals, as well as institutional partnership projects aimed at working with the collections, triangulating them with the theme of Freedom and Transgressions.

2024 will also mark the consolidation of projects such as Art and Health and Other Places, as well as the start of the Afinidades project, developed by the Soares dos Reis National Museum in partnership with the Quarteirão Criativo Association, which aims to create a network of proximity and encourage creativity among the community of jewellers in the Bombarda Quarter.

In the calendar of temporary exhibitions, 2024 will bring to the Soares dos Reis National Museum, at the end of January, the exhibition Teresa Gonçalves Lobo and Domingos António de Sequeira: a dialogue in time, curated by Bernardo Pinto de Almeida. The exhibitions O azul de safra na cerâmica de Miragaia and José Zagalo Ilharco will complete the first half of the year.

Also noteworthy is the Depositorium – Art and Gastronomy programme, through which the Soares dos Reis National Museum is challenging various chefs to take a gastronomic look at the museum’s various collections, from painting and sculpture to drawing, furniture, ceramics and jewellery. This exhibition will be accompanied by a side programme of talks and themed dinners.

In terms of publishing, the Soares dos Reis National Museum is preparing to launch a line dedicated to collections and artists, with the Complete Catalogue of the Work of Aurélia de Souza being the first in the programme.

Fully reopened in April, the Soares dos Reis National Museum ended 2023 with a total of 74,712 visitors, the second best year of the last decade in terms of public attendance, only surpassed by 2016 (totalling 98,694 visitors), the year in which the Museum presented the temporary exhibition dedicated to Amadeo de Souza Cardoso, Porto – Lisbon, 2016 – 1916 (pictured).

Before joining the studio of Cabanel and Yvon, he visited art galleries and museums in both Paris and Madrid. He moved to Rome, where he rented a studio and, in 1882, produced significant works, also in Naples and Capri.

Landscapes with a poetic and vibrant colour scheme, exercises in capturing light, genre paintings such as Cecília, and portraits, such as Senhora Vestida de Preto (Lady in Black), done in Paris, reveal his modernity, which was unusual in the Portuguese art scene.

At the end of 1883, already ill, he decided to return to Portugal. He travelled via Genoa, passing through Marseille and Barcelona, where he painted “Cais de Barcelona” (side image).

In March 1884, a few days before his death, he painted Um Ramo de Flores (A bouquet of flowers) (top image).

His work, which reveals the boldness and talent of the young painter and his absolute interest in the values of the painting itself to the detriment of the themes or the narrative, was given, after his premature death, to the Academia Portuense de Belas Artes.

In the collection of the Soares dos Reis National Museum, Henrique Pousão’s work is strongly represented, particularly the works Casas Brancas de Capri (The white houses of Capri), Senhora Vestida de Preto (Lady in black) and Janela das Persianas Azuis (Window with blue shutters), all classified as national treasures.

Carnival (or Seahorse, as it was originally called) was commissioned from the Brazilian painter Cândido Portinari to decorate the rooms of Rádio Tupi in Rio de Janeiro, along with seven other panels.

In 1949, the radio station suffered a fire which destroyed part of the decoration. The two surviving panels were given to the Portuguese State in 1951 by Assis Chateaubriand. One of the paintings went to the Soares dos Reis National Museum and the other to the Museum of Contemporary Art – Museu do Chiado.

Seahorse represents a festival typical of the Pernambuco region, celebrated on Three Kings’ Day. The theme was part of a programme commissioned by Assis Chateaubriand, celebrating Brazilian culture or defining “Brazilianness”, focused on a specific political ideology that reinforced the role of the “black man”, the “indigenous man” and the “white man” in the formation of Brazilian society.

Credits
On the cover: Self-portrait, Cândido Portinari, 1957 @Projeto Portinari
In the text: Carnival, Cândido Portinari, 1942, Soares dos Reis National Museum collection

With a great knowledge of drawing techniques expressed in a constant concern for the “balance of proportion and line”, he proved to be more of a draughtsman than a painter. He was also an excellent portrait painter. The value that João António Correia placed on drawing as the basis for training any artist, regardless of their vocation, combined with a critical and demanding yet liberal spirit, allowing his pupils to develop their personal qualities, earned him a beneficial professorship that exerted considerable influence on both his generation and those that followed.

Not limiting his work exclusively to portraits, he also tackled other themes such as historical, religious and still life painting, albeit on a smaller scale. He took part in several triennial exhibitions at the Academia Portuense de Belas Artes and the Sociedade Promotora de Belas Artes.

Image: Oil on canvas The Black Man, João António Correia, 1869, presented in the long-term exhibition

Immortalised by the sculptor António Soares dos Reis, António Augusto Firmino dos Santos Almeida was born on 22 July 1842, to José Ribeiro and Maria Augusta dos Santos Almeida, in the parish of Vitória, Porto.

He entered the Porto Academy of Fine Arts in 1865, at the age of 23. Two years later, he modelled António Soares dos Reis, his colleague at the Academy, for the Bust of Firmino with which Soares dos Reis entered the competition for State Pensioner.

Some critics called this work “Desafio” (Challenge) because they considered it to be “a sculpture with soul, of great inner richness, evident not only in the firmness of the gaze but also in the oblique position, very different from traditional canons, demonstrating a different aesthetic concept from the one he had learnt from his masters.”[1]

This type of bust, positioned facing forwards with the head twisted, was not repeated in Soares dos Reis’ work. It must have been studied in a sketch drawing, which identifies the model’s features, with wavy hair and a moustache.

Despite having been a regular student at the Academia Portuense de Belas Artes, attending classes in Historical Drawing, Painting and Sculpture, Firmino applied in 1872, at the age of 30, for the position of doorman at the Museu Portuense (or Ateneu D. Pedro), having been ranked 1st out of the nine candidates who applied.

In the following years, he applied for the post of guard at the Academia Portuense de Belas Artes and the Museu Portuense, but it wasn’t until 1901 – due to the death of the current guard – that he was appointed as the Museum’s doorman on an interim basis. The general competition for the permanent post took place on 15 February 1901 and António Augusto Firmino dos Santos Almeida, already 59 years old, came first.

Eight candidates took part in the competition, who were tested on grammatical analysis, the writing of letters and mathematical operations. The absolute merit of each candidate was voted on by the five members of the evaluation committee, which included António Teixeira Lopes, at the time a merit scholar at the Academia Portuense de Belas Artes.

[1] M. Silva (1889), A Modernidade na Arte de Soares dos Reis

Early on, he began his literary activity in newspapers and magazines. In the 1920s, José Régio collaborated with the Porto magazines Crisálida and A Nossa Revista, as well as the Coimbra magazines Bizâncio and Tríptico. But it was in Coimbra that he consolidated his literary skills, as a result of his intense contact with the books that came to influence his work, as well as his contact with the intellectuals who marked one of the most fruitful periods of the 20th century, both in terms of literary creation and criticism.

The year after graduating, he published his first volume of poetry Poemas de Deus e do Diabo (Poems of God and the Devil), signing it with the literary pseudonym José Régio.

In March 1927, together with João Gaspar Simões and Branquinho da Fonseca, he founded the magazine Presença, which lasted thirteen years and was considered the magazine that publicised the “second modernism”.

After completing his studies, he began his teaching career, with a brief stint as a temporary teacher at the Alexandre Herculano High School in Porto, until he was appointed, in 1930, as a permanent teacher at the Portalegre High School, a position he held until he retired in 1962.

From then on, he lived alternately between Vila do Conde and Portalegre, until he settled permanently in Vila do Conde in 1966.

José Régio died on 22 December 1969 from heart disease.

José de Figueiredo was the uncle of Manuel de Figueiredo, a writer and thinker who, for several years (1961 – 1968), was the director of the Soares dos Reis Museum, responsible for setting up the museum’s educational service and encouraging the teaching and reading of works of art.

A law graduate, Manuel de Figueiredo was also recognised as Director of the Porto Commercial Association, Councillor of Porto City Council and member of the Municipal Commissions for Art, Archaeology and Urbanism.

A fruit seller from Rua de Camões was António Soares dos Reis’ model for this sculpture. He covered her in classical panelling, composed in multiple unfoldings forming a harmonious arrangement, as was his style, allowing one of the lower limbs to move forward as much as necessary to enliven the sculpture.

The study of the evidence reveals a work of undisputed artistic superiority to which the drawings, which predate the construction of the work, must be invoked. The first two studies contain very vivid shading and definition of lines, in a game of modelling forms in collaboration with the light; they are instantaneous captures, revealing affective involvement, in which the artist finds the inspiration for the theme in a popular figure of a woman.

A work of insistence in search of the ideal framing is extracted from a third drawing, where the desire to visualise the figure as a statue itself is imprinted, whose construction is multiplied in countless contours of movement, with the insertion of iconographic details such as the stick and the half-moon. (…)

By the mid-1970s, Soares dos Reis was determined to stop carving in wood and would turn to portraits and, more rarely, large-scale statuary. Even so, he would still fulfil orders for religious pieces, modelling the Agonising Christ for José Pedreira and the pair of saints for Pestana da Silva’s chapel.

Source SANTOS, Paula M. Mesquita Leite, A escultura religiosa de Soares dos Reis e a iconografia da Virgem para Guimarães. Revista de Guimarães, 112 Jan.-Dez. 2002, p. 385-408.

He was the author of the sculptural decoration for the Royal Schooner of D. Miguel, and carved figures and ornaments for the stern, bow and saddlebags of sailing ships built at the Ouro shipyards in Porto and Vila Nova de Gaia. He drew and lithographed portraits of political celebrities and produced miniatures.

He took part in several exhibitions at the Academia Portuense de Belas Artes, where he presented works such as Venus lying down (1854), O tempo (1863), Viriato swearing on the corpse of a young woman in the eternal war against the Romans (bas-relief 1866), the Bust of the Count of Samodães (1874, pictured) and the self-portrait of King Pedro IV on horseback (fired clay and bronze, 1878).

In parallel with his artistic career, he developed educational activities. In 1834, he was appointed substitute professor of the Drawing Class at the Royal Academy, although he was removed from this position by the decree of 19 October 1836 due to his refusal to swear to the Constitution of 1822. In 1840 he was appointed to serve on an interim basis in the Chair of Drawing at the University of Coimbra, attached to the Faculty of Mathematics.

In 1842, he was appointed a Sculpture lecturer at the Academia Portuense de Belas Artes, where he was Soares dos Reis’s master. He directed the Academy (1864-1882) and retired in 1880. He died on 5 October 1882.

Photo Credits

On the cover: Miniature portrait (tempera on ivory) of Manuel da Fonseca Pinto, c. 1851, by Francisca de Almeida Furtado. In the collection of the National Museum of Ancient Art in Lisbon, Portugal.
In the article: Bust of the Count of Samodães, Inspector of the Academia Portuense de Belas Artes (plaster), by Manuel da Fonseca Pinto, 1st half of the 19th century. Collection of the Soares dos Reis National Museum (184 Esc MNSR).

Considering Order No. 12959-A/2023, of December 18, 2023, which grants time allowance to workers who perform public functions in direct State administration services, on December 26, 2023 and January 2, 2024, it was determined:

– For reasons of public interest, on December 26, 2023 and January 2, 2024, services dependent on the General Directorate of Cultural Heritage will remain open to the public, closing on December 24 and 31, 2023.

– Museums, Monuments and Palaces will also be closed on December 25th and January 1st.

Started in the 1980s, the Treger Saint Silvestre Collection, on display at the Centro de Arte Oliva, includes a large collection of works of Art Brut, one of the most important and extensive private collections in the world, with a large number of renowned authors.

The exhibition “Portreto de la Animo” is a section of this collection that brings together a group of works focussing on portraits and self-portraits.

The portraits reveal an inner figure, a particularly vivid creativity and invention, as can be seen in the works of Aloïse Corbaz, Ted Gordon, James Deed, Edemund Monsiel, Aleksander Lobanov, Alessandra Michelangelo or the Portuguese artist Jaime Fernandes, among others. Many of them appear to be self-portraits that claim an existence of which these artists were and felt deprived.

The “Portreto de la Animo” exhibition is being promoted in partnership with São João da Madeira City Council, the Centro de Arte Oliva and collectors António Saint Silvestre and Richard Treger, with the patronage support of the Millennium bcp Foundation and Lusitânia Seguros and the institutional support of Círculo Dr José de Figueiredo – Associação de Amigos do MNSR.

It will be open to the public until 31 December 2023.

Born in Valparaíso (Chile) on 13 June 1866, she settled in Porto at the age of 3 with her parents, Portuguese emigrants to Latin America. It was in Invicta that he began his artistic apprenticeship with private drawing and painting lessons from Caetano Moreira da Costa Lima. At the age of 27, she entered the Academia Portuense de Belas-Artes, which she attended between 1893 and 1898.

In 1899, Aurélia de Souza travelled to Paris for three years to complete the courses taught by Jean-Paul Laurens and Benjamin Constant at the Julien Academy. It was during this period that she painted her famous “Self-Portrait” (1900), which is now in the collection of the Soares dos Reis National Museum.

The parallel programme of the Portreto de la Animo Art Brut Etc. exhibition proposes, on 13 December, at 1.30pm, a commented visit by Miguel Almeida, from the Centro de Arte Oliva, dedicated to the artist Jaime Fernandes (Portugal, 1899 – 1969).

“Jaime Fernandes is unequivocally the most recognised artist of Portuguese Outsider Art. However, this recognition takes place mainly abroad, a fact that can be explained either by the loss of a large part of his work or by the fact that most of it is dispersed in collections abroad.

This obscurity has to do with the circumstances of his isolated life, the way in which he developed his work and how it subsequently circulated: diagnosed with schizophrenia in 1938, Jaime was hospitalised for more than three decades at the Miguel Bombarda Hospital (Lisbon), where he died in 1969.

According to testimonies and references to his drawings in the hospital’s clinical records, as well as the letters he wrote to his wife, Jaime Fernandes unexpectedly began drawing at the age of 66, four years before his death.

All of his known work is made up of undated drawings, made with coloured ballpoint pens on various types of paper. In them, a small number of figures, including imaginary animals, human or anthropomorphic figures appear and reappear in countless variations, always drawn in a dense weave of lines.

His letters, other writings and drawings were filmed after his death by António Reis and Margarida Cordeiro, giving rise to the film Jaime (1974), which marked the first public moment of publicity for the artist’s work.

In the words of António Reis, Jaime Fernandes “was perfectly aware of the space to be occupied by the drawing or painting. As he was limited by the small dimensions of the paper, many of his figures – men – have their arms down or raised, while the animal figures have their tails down. Therefore, the attitudes of the drawing are always a function of the delimitation of the paper, for which he always found an ingenious plastic solution. They may also be linked to an emotional, obsessive stereotyping and archetypes…””

Source: Centro de Arte Oliva

Sculptor, essayist and pedagogue, it was as a statuary that he became most famous. He entered the Lisbon School of Fine Arts in 1923, studying Painting and Architecture, before studying Sculpture, a course he completed in 1929.

In 1933 he won a scholarship from the Institute of High Culture and travelled to Italy. He took part in the Portuguese World Exhibition in 1940 (statue of King João I) and, in 1949, began teaching at the Porto School of Fine Arts, settling in the city.

Throughout the 1940s and 1950s, his work gained notoriety and recognition, receiving numerous awards, such as the Mestre Manuel Pereira Sculpture Prize (1945 and 1951), the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation’s Grand Prize for Sculpture (1957) or first place in the competition for the monument to Prince Henry the Navigator (Sagres, 1958). He was the author, for example, of the bust of Silva Porto, inaugurated in 1950 in Porto’s S. Lázaro Garden (in the image).

Between 1950 and 1960, Barata Feyo accumulated his artistic and teaching activities with the direction of the Soares dos Reis National Museum, later taking on the post of Assistant Conservator of National Museums and Palaces.

He also devoted himself to drawing and writing, authoring the books A Escultura de Alcobaça (1945) and José Tagarro (1960), and numerous articles on artists in the newspaper O Comércio do Porto. (from a text by Joana Baião)

After returning from Paris, Heitor Cramez taught for a few years at the Technical School in Vila Real and later at the Soares dos Reis School of Decorative Arts in Porto. In 1948 he joined the city’s School of Fine Arts as a Drawing teacher, a position he held until his jubilee in 1959.

It was in this context that Cramez’s contribution to artistic evolution, especially in Porto, proved most valuable, because he belonged to a generation of teachers whose activity led to the renewal of academic teaching, training generations of new artists in more modern moulds and with greater openness to new currents and forms of expression.

Heitor Cramez’s work is varied, but his portraits, of an intimate nature, and landscapes, in which the mountains of Trás-os-Montes predominate, reflect his roots, of which he was so proud, stand out. His stay in Paris and his interaction with the aforementioned artists could not fail to influence his work. Demanding and modest about his work, Heitor Cramez took part in few exhibitions, confining himself almost exclusively to Porto.

Heitor Cramez’s work is mainly in private collections, both in Portugal and France, which makes it little known to the general public.

He died in Mira, Coimbra, on 30 August 1967.

The aim of the exercise is to improve the Museum team’s ability to respond to a possible fire in the galleries of the Carrancas Palace, ensuring not only the evacuation of people, but also the safeguarding of the works that make up the museum collection (Simulacrum of Intervention and Evacuation of Cultural Property).

These meetings allow for the creation of new synergies and closer co-operation between the Soares dos Reis National Museum – as an institution that manages cultural assets – and the different services of Civil Protection, for a more effective management of crisis situations, with control and reduction of losses and damage.

With the aim of finalising his artistic training, he left for Paris in 1854, funded in particular by King Ferdinand II, joining the studio of Adolphe Yvon, where he worked under his direction for five years. On his return to Portugal, he resumed his position at the Academia Portuense de Belas Artes, continuing in the same role as regent of the chair of Historical Painting until his retirement.

He produced a vast and varied body of work, marked by a few lapses in quality that earned him heated criticism from some of his colleagues while he was still alive. Known for his genre painting, in which he depicted popular types and customs from the northern regions, Resende also painted numerous portraits, some landscapes, flowers and still lifes. His artistic activity included miniatures, occasionally sculpture, and extended to literary criticism, collaborating with various newspapers, especially “O Comércio do Porto”.

He took part in numerous exhibitions in Portugal and abroad, namely in Paris, Madrid and London, where he was awarded a silver medal for his painting “Pescadores de Leça”. Following in Roquemont’s footsteps with a genre painting that emphasised the picturesque side of customs, Resende marked his place in the history of Portuguese romanticism.

Francisco José Resende died on 30 November 1893. Six years after the artist’s death, his daughter Claire donated the canvas “Amai-vos uns aos outros” (“Love one Another”) (detail in the photo) to the Academia Portuense de Belas Artes, a painting that is now part of the Soares dos Reis National Museum collection.

He came to Portugal in 1828 at his father’s request. The prince was politically supporting King Miguel I, whom he had met in Vienna. Roquemont, as his private secretary, accompanied him during his stay in Portugal and stayed on after his return to Germany.

The north of the country was chosen as the place of residence and Guimarães and Porto were the most important cities in which he lived. The former is linked to the beginning of his stay in Portugal, where he was a guest of the Count of Azenha – a supporter of King Miguel – and spent long periods there. This approach influenced his appointment in 1831 as Professor of Drawing at the Royal Academy of Marine and Commerce, a post he turned down in order to devote himself entirely to painting.

After occasional stays in Lisbon, in 1847 he settled permanently in Porto, where he died in 1852.

Master of Francisco José Rezende and João Correia, he profoundly marked the first generation of romantic painters. Attentive to the realism with which Roquemont treated his portraits and to the novelties introduced into Portuguese painting, through landscape and customs paintings – one of Romanticism’s favourite themes – they allowed themselves to be influenced, contributing to a beneficial teacher training that would bear fruit in the second half of the 19th century. In addition to oil painting, Roquemont also worked in pencil, charcoal and smudge.

Image: Oil on canvas Procissão (Procession) by August Roquemont on display in the long-term exhibition

Before joining the studio of Cabanel and Yvon, he visited art galleries and museums in both Paris and Madrid. He moved to Rome, where he rented a studio and, in 1882, produced significant works, also in Naples and Capri.

Landscapes with a poetic and vibrant colour scheme, exercises in capturing light, genre paintings such as Cecília, and portraits, such as Senhora Vestida de Preto (Lady in Black), done in Paris, reveal his modernity, which was unusual in the Portuguese art scene.

At the end of 1883, already ill, he decided to return to Portugal. He travelled via Genoa, passing through Marseille and Barcelona, where he painted “Cais de Barcelona” (side image).

In March 1884, a few days before his death, he painted Um Ramo de Flores (A bouquet of flowers) (top image).

His work, which reveals the boldness and talent of the young painter and his absolute interest in the values of the painting itself to the detriment of the themes or the narrative, was given, after his premature death, to the Academia Portuense de Belas Artes.

In the collection of the Soares dos Reis National Museum, Henrique Pousão’s work is strongly represented, particularly the works Casas Brancas de Capri (The white houses of Capri), Senhora Vestida de Preto (Lady in black) and Janela das Persianas Azuis (Window with blue shutters), all classified as national treasures.

In Porto, in December 1967, a few months after his death, an exhibition of the paintings, some unfinished, left in the painter’s studio was held at the Alvarez Gallery. The very next year, in April, the first retrospective exhibition of his work was held, organised by the National Information Secretariat.

Eduardo Viana was the eldest of a group of painters born between 1881 and 1893 who marked the first modern generation in Portugal: Viana, Amadeo, Santa Rita and Almada.

His contact with Amadeo and Robert and Sónia Delaunay led him to experiment and compose works with an abstract tendency. Fundamental documents of Portuguese modernity, the paintings he made in 1925 for the decoration of the café A Brasileira, landscapes of Sintra and the Algarve, along with the nudes of the same year, the artist’s “programme painting”, are examples of the maturity he reached and expressed in chromatic sensualism.

From 1940 onwards, permanently in Portugal, isolated from everything and everyone, he concentrated on still life, the almost exclusive subject of his painting from then on.

Image: Louça de Barcelos (Barcelos Pottery) (1915)

Featuring different film and musical genres, from jazz to electronica, including traditional Portuguese music, this year the sessions will be held in emblematic locations in the cities of Leiria, Porto and Lisbon.

One of the main novelties of the edition is the inclusion of the Soares dos Reis National Museum in the list of chosen stages. In Porto, the cycle will also pass through São Bento Railway Station, Cinema Trindade and Casa das Artes.

In total, 12 concert films will be held, between November and December, in the seventh edition of the Salão Piolho cycle, an initiative of the Inatel Foundation that invites Portuguese musicians to create sound approaches to silent film classics.

This year’s edition begins with three shows in Leiria, on the 3rd, 4th and 5th of November, in a bet by Inatel to take the cycle further. In the Salão Piolho, which takes its name from the places where, in the past, cinema was shown, these classics are accompanied by soundtracks of Portuguese music, from folk, to traditional music, jazz and electronica.

Fernando de Castro (Sé, 26 Nov. 1888 – Paranhos, 7 Oct. 1946) was a collector and businessman from Porto who was also known for his poetic style, which he manifested in his publications, his love of reading and his penchant for drawing, having created several series of caricatures.

Fernando de Castro lived in Rua das Flores next to his father’s shop, whose business thrived on glass, mirrors and painted paper. Between 1893-1908, the businessman embarked on the construction of a new house in Rua de Costa Cabral in Porto.

From an early age, Fernando de Castro grew up in an imaginary full of style figures and icons, particularly with regard to the furniture and furnishings of the Costa Cabral house – a heritage he preserved and respected after his father’s death in 1918.

As an adult, he developed his cultural interests in a circle of friends linked to business and with a particular taste for the arts and literature. It was after his mother’s death in 1925 that Fernando de Castro acquired new objects and artworks.

The Fernando de Castro House-Museum has been administered by the Soares dos Reis National Museum since 1952, which organises several guided tours of the space.

Access to the Fernando de Castro House-Museum is always by prior online booking and subject to confirmation of availability. For group visits, the maximum number of participants is 10.

Cover image
Portrait of Fernando de Castro, oil on canvas, by Alberto Joaquim da Silva, 1933

The artist also had a career in teaching, having been a professor at the Industrial and Commercial Institute of Porto for 44 years. He also taught at the Porto School of Fine Arts as interim professor for several subjects.

He worked as a publicist for the magazines Arte Portuguesa and A Águia and was an effective member of the Art and Archaeology Council of the 3rd District.

He died in Porto in 1932.

Image: The Fisherman, oil on canvas, by J. A. Ribeiro, 1917 (?)

The exhibition was preceded by an important campaign of restoration, research and valorisation of Spanish paintings. It is curated by Joaquim Oliveira Caetano, director of the National Museum of Ancient Art, and Benito Navarrete, professor of art history at Complutense University, and is part of the cultural activities of the Spanish Presidency of the European Union.

Artworks lent by the Soares dos Reis National Museum: