Modern Architecture in Portugal

The "Athens Charter" published in 1935, is on the conclusions of the IV International Congress of Modern Architecture, 1933, entitled "Functional City", and resulted in a manifest urban programming, as opposed to the chaos of the Industrial City. The proposals are on the four functions of the City, Housing, Recreation, and Work Movement, measured on a human scale, where the private interest should be subordinate to the public interest.

In Portugal, in 1945, there is the insertion of the chairs "Urbanism" and "History and Theory of Urbanism" in the Courses of Architecture School of Fine Arts, introducing several concepts, such as the hierarchy of road networks the nuclei and steered zoning.

At the National Congress of Architects in 1948, an event concurrent with the exhibition on "Fifteen years of Public Works," which reflected the principles of urban tradition and nationalism emerges in opposition to the idea of a new concept of city, by three architects who stood out in defense of the "Radiant City" and "Athens Charter": Viana de Lima, Arménio Losa and Lobão Vital.

Is it not possible to understand the evolution of Modern Architecture and Urbanism without taking into account their ongoing relationship with the Arts and the relationship between "Art" that during the twentieth century boosted increasingly debates, a conceptual and critical spirit. These influences were manifesting themselves in several variants, either through formal mimicry, or by a methodological and procedural parallelism.

Internationally, there was a period at the beginning of the century, where painters and architects worked side by side with the request reciprocal links to dismantle the inherited tradition. The avant-garde movements of Europe fostered an exchange of results between the experiences of Architects and Painters, which sought to change the cultural conventions.

The Bauhaus, established in 1919 in Weimar, said in his proclamation that was created for "the new building of the future, covering the architecture and sculpture and painting in this unit, and that one day will rise to the skies for more than a million workers like a crystal symbol of a new faith. "

In Portugal, it was found that integration with the adoption of codes of the Brazilian architecture of postwar architectural elements reflecting the work plasticizers, dynamism, joy and desire for freedom. The color is used as part plastic, painted surfaces, or operated through the characteristics of materials

The ceramic panels emerge as a desire to resume a traditional finish, with strong roots in the Culture and Art Deco Portuguese, but a current mode, with a contemporary attitude of "Vernacular Review of the Modern Movement." The tile panels, with speeches by various artists, thought of as a work of art integrated into architecture, they obtain a result of large plastic force in architectural production of the 50s.

In Lisbon stand out in collaboration with Almada Negreiros Pardal Monteiro, and as a remarkable example of "global work", the Block of Free Waters by Nuno Teotónio Pereira, 1956, with a color study of Frederico George, low-reliefs by Jorge Vieira, mosaics of Almada Negreiros and stained glass of Cargaleiro.

Shopping Centre Restelo of Chorão Ramalho, with the collaboration of plastic Querubim Lapa, which together with Victor Palia, intervened in several Primary Schools.

Keil do Amaral developed in Campo Grande to regionalist themes, integrating panels and ceramic sculpture pieces, with the sense of an idea of "Public Art": a mosaic of Julio Pomar, a sculpture by Canto da Maya and a ceramic Jorge Barradas.

In Porto, the students in all courses, Architecture, Painting and Sculpture, lived together intimately, not only because they have common history, and because of the three arts are considered inseparable. There was discussion of Modernism in art, and a latent nonconformity in relation to teaching classic. There are numerous examples of close collaboration of Artists in works of architecture.

Apart from that will be mentioned in more detail, we have the Amial House, designed in 1953 by Celestino de Castro, with a color study of Julio Pomar.

Also there are some partnerships between architects and artists, with some longevity, and proven with many testimonies as Arménio Losa with Augusto Gomes, José Carlos Loureiro and Agostinho Ricca with Julio Resende, Carlos Neves with Manuel Pereira da Silva, Julio de Brito and Rogerio de Azevedo with Henrique Moreira.

Interventions of this sculptor, pupil of Teixeira Lopes in Oporto Academy of Fine Arts, a current proto-modernist, occurred in various collaborations with Rogério de Azevedo, as we have seen in buildings of “Comércio do Porto” newspaper and the Hotel Infante Sagres in a model where the architecture serves to support the sculpture, also experienced in refurbishing the Rivoli Theatre, Julio de Brito in the 40s, the interior painted plaster friezes and cornice in low relief, which also collaborated the sculptor Manuel Pereira da Silva.

This partnership with Rogério de Azevedo, also are his own in 1947, a marble bas-relief in the Rialto Building, a marble bust of João de Deus, in the Garden School of the Constitution, and a sculptural element in bronze and granite in the Garden of Passeio Alegre, a tribute to Raul Brandão.

In addition to various different sculptures that punctuate public spaces in the city, in their creations for the buildings are: the "Eagle" in bronze, of the “Café Imperial” in 1936, the "Indian" in “Café Guarany”, a low-relief in marble, in the Chapel of N. S ª de Fátima a low-relief in marble, in 1939, low-reliefs in granite for the Exchange of Fish by Januario Godinho and the Cod Refrigerator, a low-relief in Stone of the St.º António Congregados Church, in 1949, low-reliefs in stone for the N. S ª da Conceição Church between 1945 and 1949, and 1957 for the Oporto City Council.

All these examples of the work of Henrique Moreira follow a more classic model of integration of Sculpture in Architecture.

In building the Silk Factory, in the Street do Monte dos Burgos, designed by Arménio Losa in 1943, there are salient in volumes, two low-reliefs of Augusto Gomes, with an integrated approach in the proposed architecture, corresponding to two figures, one male and one female, with vegetal elements and alusive to the Labor, Industry and the Sea, recurring themes of the work by this author.

“Cinema Batalha”, Artur Andrade project, dated 1944 and completed in 1947, had the artistic contributions of Júlio Pomar and Américo Braga. From the first, fresh in foyers along the stairs, the second, a bas-relief on the facade facing side the Square “Batalha”. Both interventions provoked a political and social unrest, following the complaint of the Oporto City Council to the Ministry of Interior. The works were covered with plastic paint and low-reliefs were removed the hammer and sickle.

Panel placed without any kind of shot on the flat plane of the side wall of the building, with male and female figures arranged in three heights, representing real and allegorical figures on a background here and there punctuated by stars referring to the world of film.

On the bottom the only characters include dresses and shoes in a realistic way, constituting the symbolic support of the entire composition, in allusion to the work. On the left, next to a tree of life and ahead of a harvest, a farmer with forearm secure a bunch of wheat, and stands with his right hand a sickle.

In the center, a laborer at a construction carries on his shoulders a thick iron chain that holds his left hand while his right hand, before being mutilated wielding a hammer. Even this plan, a seated figure conceived in idealized form, displays a book, an allusion to artistic creation. In the higher planes, bodies originating in traditional design in the universe seem to metaphorically hover ethereal and timeless, aesthetically integrated combination of classicism, which is characteristic of neo-realism. "

The avant-garde spirit of Arthur Andrade does not refer solely to the radicalism of the remarkable architectural design solution to the street corner where you can simultaneously connect to the urban fabric and the highlight mode, but also the insertion of a set of works of art, whether neo-realist, which appear clearly as opposed to the regime. In this case, "Synthesis of the three arts" actually contains the very formal evolution of flight from sobriety geometric shapes using more complex than the slang of the day designated as "forms of chicanery."

In the 50s, the Cavan began to be publicized and used as a coating of buildings, beginning a search to take advantage of their aesthetic plasticity, since it was possible by the additive color and type of granules of marble or limestone used to draw diverse reasons, where the colors were separated by a metal.

The residential building in the Square D. Afonso V, designed by Francisco Pereira da Costa, in 1953, has decorative elements, in Cavan, on the tops of side walls. The ground floor, to trade, has a portico that provides the transition between the private and public space of the square, corresponding to the structural system, which finds itself in a standardized geometric mesh of the remaining floors. The existence of the decorative elements on the facades side refers to a clear reference to the Modern Movement.

Primary School of the Constitution, a project of Alexandre de Sousa, Architect of the Oporto City Council between 1956 and 58, can be observed in a stairwell, a mural by Costa Martins on blue marble, which is the technique of Cavan as well as one tempera by the same author, in the cafeteria and multipurpose, a child and playful theme.

Other examples of application of Cavan, as coating aesthetic feature, is a chalet of Arménio Losa in “Avenida dos Combatentes”, the 50s, where the wall has a side panel with an abstract design, and the “Paranhos” Neighborhood, or “Outeiro”, where its design as Social Neighborhood City Council initiative of the early '60s, did not prevent its classification plastic panels in each block, and a variety of reasons geometric figuration. The creation of the “Via de Cintura Interna” came a difficult perception more closer.

Creations by Jorge Barradas in 1950 for Atlantic Palace, 1946 draft of the Society of Architects / ARS, refer to a panel disclosed in the faience, inside, and a set of ceramic panels on the roof of the arcade outside. The mythological theme, focusing on references to national folklore and practice of grassland work, fits the use to which the building was intended, the desired exaltation of nationalistic values of "Portugal beyond the Seas."

At the Church of S ª da Boavista, draft Agostinho Ricca, 1979, in addition to fifteen glazed ceramic plates of 16.5 cm, dated 1986, titled "Steps of Christ's Passion and Resurrection," there are other works of Júlio Resende, as The windows, "Christ on Calvary" and a carpet that covers the central area of the church. This case shows that, regardless of academic training of the architect, devoted to the artistic conception, when an artist involved with the versatility of disciplinary Júlio Resende, all the architectural work earns a substantial depth.

FERNANDES, José Manuel - Modernist Architecture in Portugal. Lisbon: Gradiva, 1993.

Africa Generation

Architecture and Cities in Angola and Mozambique, 1925-1975, Ed. Livros Horizonte, is an important book for several reasons. The trail iconography of Portuguese architecture in the overseas areas during the twentieth century, 'a new central colonial', conceives of a 'vision' and an ability to deliver on those territories that the 'Metropolis' hardly reproduced until very recently. Or rather, the 'recasting' of architectural territories overseas, said the former colonies of Angola and Mozambique, was an opportunity to expose the work of a lot of architects, whose number of outputs is, on the whole, a remarkable testimony to the heritage of the collective attitude towards the application of planning and deployment of 'African space', and 'empire'.

Cycle, the inevitability that history often plays, whether it is currently widely repeated, with a new lease that will surely also relevant results.

Jose Manuel Fernandes, architect and teacher in the School of Architecture at the Technical University of Lisbon, invited the seminarian course in architecture at the Autonomous University of Lisbon, is one of the few architects with a literary work that can be considered relevant, and has written about the Portuguese architecture (and world) in a consistent and systematic in the past twenty years (at least), either in book or in articles written for the press.

Has chronicles published in the weekly magazine Expresso, carried along with architect Manuel Graça Dias - another author of books on architecture - strangely discontinued in favor of a new profile of the magazine (s) - questionable, it is true the lack of space for these kinds of texts - have always been an epitome of quality and rigor, by reflecting on the genesis and architecture for a personal reading (nay), with particular attention to all forms, styles, trends (without exception) and a great respect for history and the facts.

'Africa Generation' is assumed as a demonstration of how the work of Portuguese architects in Angola towns, such as Lobito, Nova Lisboa (Huambo), Benguela and Malange, and cities in Mozambique, Lourenço Marques (now Maputo), Nampula , Beira and Quelimane. Registration of the text, between the use of historical fact, artistic and sometimes personal, architects involved, especially in the first part, is substantiated by the black and white photographs of various authors and the very José Manuel Fernandes, illustrating the leitmotif. In particular, some of these photographic reproductions are part of the private collection of Victor Pavoeiro Ferreira ('Victor Ferreira,' my father), who was always with a NIKON (NIKORMAT model) and a tripod in hand, even when he was at war overseas. And, indeed prescient, very well photographed architecture. He had a fondness for 'framework', which the extensive collection of slides just to confirm. We were then waiting for the second edition of this book, about to be published, perhaps in color.

This work starts from the notion that architecture and urbanism of Portuguese roots, affirmed throughout the twentieth century - and who have received extensive study in the Iberian and European area, in recent years - will only be fully and coherently explained if we studied the presence and parallel statement in overseas areas.

Choosing the territories of Angola and Mozambique - the most significant time considered, among several ex-colonial areas -, this essay seeks to provide a first contribution to that study, which are to come to be increasingly global.

It is also important to note what is meant here and interprets the "Twentieth Century" as having the Portuguese context, the real or actual beginning after World War I, about the dawn of the second quarter to nine hundred. Moreover, this study focuses on the historical stage by 1975 - that is, until the time of independence of the spaces considered Africans - because obviously we are concerned here to examine the urban-themed architectural roots, Portuguese influence and cultural context, something that becomes fully thereafter. Thus, speaking of architecture, urbanism theme at the "Portuguese Africa" is mostly talking about half a century situated between 1925 and 1975.

In this work it is the articulation of historical information, published or unpublished, with more recent data, and an audiovisual collection and oral testimonies direct result of trying to organize a discussion and an initial summary of this documentation and these testimonies. It is also necessary to mention that the understanding and justification of this study is to articulate the urban experience and urban planning with the work and architectural practice - especially since many of the professionals listed here and worked in both fields simultaneously - because we believe those two fields creation and knowledge as complementary and inseparable, in a sense interactive.

A generation of Portuguese architects left a vast work in Angola and Mozambique. Held in the third quarter of the century, this was an extremely avant-garde production of innovative and accomplished within colonial African who must now protect.

Little or nothing known, nor in his life nor in his work, were nevertheless applied builders Africa's century, in planning and urban design, architecture and arts. We speak of the "heroic generation" of Portuguese architects who, born mostly in years 10 and 20, formed in the postwar schools of Lisbon and Porto, have been living and working mainly in Angola and Mozambique over the decades of 40, 50 and 60.

Some have lived there, inserted in the middle colonies, and then came to the metropolis of completing their studies.

This was the case of Vasco Vieira da Costa (1911-1982), born in Aveiro, who studied and worked with Le Corbusier is a remarkable work in Luanda. Vasco Vieira da Costa set up in Luanda in 1960, having gone to Oporto in 1982, a few months before his death. With a small stake in the Exhibition-Fair of Angola in 1938, its kick-off with the draft Market Kinaxixi (1950-52) at Piazza Kinaxixi (1953), built by the firm "Castillos" a block for servants of the State, at Rua Amilcar Cabral (Set OBRES Modernes ... 1996), the whole pavilion, though incomplete Engineering Laboratory of Angola. As their own, the building's Diamang Rua Lopes Lima, the building of Versailles, at Avenida Rainha Ginga, an outstanding building of the Ministry of Public Works, commonly known as building Mutamba (1968-69), with a strong Corbusian mainly in the grids, the English School (Futungo Fine), Gedaliah (workshop and booth), Secil the tower and House of Brokers in the February 4, the Anangola and still factory Fabimor. There were many other works that he left here, the aesthetic quality and remarkable versatility in its functionality. Vieira da Costa deserves much more than these few words, and I think that with the growing number of architects Angolans, he will have the honor that has been repeatedly delayed.

But others, then recently graduated, went to Africa "to be free ', to get his professional life in a more open and modern, something simple and seemingly normal, but they felt they were somehow denied or impeded in the homeland Europe.

Was the case with talented José Pinto da Cunha, reputed author of numerous houses' for the rich "here, including the current residence of the ambassador of Portugal, designed the first duplex on Marginal, but above all creative works and bold Luanda innovative, between 63 and 67, as the modern Quarter Hold (a vast array type Olivais lisboetas 'in good'), the building of the National Radio of Angola (Built on land where there was an exhibition, "Overseas, whose halls participated some architects living in Luanda in the 60s). The great work of this architect, in association with the Costa Pereira Cyril was the building built in downtown Luanda, Rua Major Kanhangulo Opened in 1958, which is work still to take, within a certain period of architecture in colonial Africa.

José Pinto da Cunha was the son of one of the most repressive faculty of the School of Fine Arts in Lisbon, which came to lead an authentic "forced migration" of students, collectively leaded in 42, to complete the course in Porto.

It was also the case of Francisco Castro Rodrigues (1920), the remarkable 'architect of Lobito', which generously offered their talent and professional life to the time it became the second city of Angola. Although overseen by the PIDE, Roberts managed to establish himself in Lobito on 53 and there conducted a real 'global work', whereas a slight but active municipal official. Was planner, urban planner and architect, performing for the new urban expansion areas many of the best equipment (between 64-66), in characteristically light and modern design, such as school, market, the airport, the elegant terrace cine Flamingo.

Only since 1975, started working in the capital, Luanda has so few papers with your signature.

Robinson was an exceptional course in Angola, as 'was', by adhesion and taste, since independence, contributing to the organization's current architecture of the young Republic of Angola until 87. Their work, while teaching at the faculty of architecture at the University Agostinho Neto, was colossal importance.

When you leave Angola in 1988, leaves at Lobito "every corner of your risk and the dash.
Invited by the city of Lobito to the celebrations of the city, returned there in 1993, honored and touched.

Already the architect of natural Luanda, Jonathan Simões de Carvalho, who also tyrosine in the atelier of Le Corbusier, is a figure of more diversified business, with works in Luanda, but also in London and Brazil. Between 63 and 65, was author, with Pinto da Cunha, Hospital of Lubango (Sa da Bandeira former) and also with Alfredo Fernando Pereira, Barrio Hold Luanda. Intervention had a persistent and continuous training in municipal planning of Luanda.

Many other writers and works with modernity could be part of this list in Angola and Mozambique, a first search, can be grouped more than fifty names of architects there set.

In Angola, still refer to such names as Antonio Campino with the President or the Auto Hotel Avenue in Luanda, the Brothers Garcia de Castilho, pioneers of the '50s, which he built in Luanda Film Restoration or the grand building Mobil (1951), the Battle of Fernando (1908), who worked for the National Monuments in Angola, of the Pereira da Costa (with the Building Cyril, the 'cycle of coffee', 59), the Louis Taquelim (born Algarve, it seems the author of Moxico Hotel / Vila Luso).

And not forgetting the most fleeting passes, but marked by an uncompromising action, such as Francisco Silva Dias (1930), which earned her resignation from the Board of Luanda (dared publicly to advocate that the planning was led by local architects!) - yet the author of the draft technical school of Saurimo, in the remote Lunda, 59 (work discovered that there are days, surprised to have been built) or Teotonio Pereira and Nuno Bartolomeu Costa Cabral, authors of a small 'mini city industrial 'Modern Pulp Enterprise (High Catumbela, Benguela - 58-59).

In Mozambique there are also a number of authors and works of great quality. Besides Amancio Guedes Miranda (or Pancho Guedes, Lisbon, 1925), already better known and prized for its unique and diverse workforce Laurentian, and other newer (Jose Forjaz, Coimbra, 1936) - there is mention architects unfairly unknown or forgotten John Joseph Taylor (1983), author of notable modern works adapted to the climatic context (Terminal Nampula; seat of Government of Niassa, Lichinga, - 66-68); José Porto (1963), author of the wonderful Grand Hotel Beira and several buildings in the city center, the years 40-50, Francisco Castro (designer of the Beira railway station) or Garizo Carmo (Cinema S. Jorge, Beira). And not forgetting, again, the authors point passing through the territory, as José Bastos Gomes (1914-1991), author of the splendid and super decorated BNU Lourenço Marques (now the Bank of Mozambique in Maputo).

What is striking in all these works, the scale is innovative and modern, with no shame, fear or hesitation, although established in the middle of the colonial situation, and in many cases 'super provincial'. What we admire and esteem is the greatness of sights, cultural, and artistic techniques of a generation of "professional migrants", who, working often in contexts of the administration official was able to launch 'new towns', full of brand new modern architecture the various and vast areas of the territories then Luso-Africans. Especially between 1950 and 1975. Because it must be said, a quarter century after management ended with some objectivity, this architecture and urbanism have reached this size and quality higher than that practiced at the same time the 'Metropolis'.

And just a situation of complete confidence in the innovation of collective enthusiasm, despite the line of differences (between state, private developers, municipal action) and understanding and acceptance of a new scale geographic, economic and social development (with some ingenuity and a taste for discovery, which is beneficial in these cases) may explain this. In contrast to a metropolitan society, who resisted modernization in 'Portuguese Africa' in the third quarter of the century it was possible to try and even food and bring newness and modernity of spaces and architectures in a period of 25 years, in fact the only context Europe, since European countries (democracy in post-World War II) had almost entirely abandoned since the colonial territories in Africa to 60-61.

During this time, ironically, Portugal was thus the 'unique case' of a nation with retrograde political system at European level which had a production leading innovator in its space colonial Africa.

Now, looking at the possible future of this great legacy material, between cities and buildings, we must know the insert (what's left, and it is recoverable) in the new context of post-civil wars, new nations of Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique and hopefully soon in Angola. Knowing the value of what is, better able to recover, reuse and integrate.

Antonio Veloso, did the project for the plant Jomar, the road of Cuca (N'Gola Kiluange), and even some buildings in the avenue, on land divided between various owners from the north of Portugal, who gave these works to their "fellow countrymen "with a strong regionalist, since the architects chosen were all from the College of Fine Arts of Porto (Gennaro Godinho, Vieira da Costa, Adalberto Dias Pereira da Costa Pinto da Cunha and of course, Antonio Veloso).

The architect designed the George Clark Fosforeira Angola and a tube factory in 1958, and water treatment plant in Gika Commander.

The BCA, the work "flagship" in downtown, is authored by Gennaro Godinho, and a curiosity it should be noted that the design of Bank of Angola is the architect Vasco Regaleira, who like Paulo Cunha (who did the work zone Port of Luanda and wide front) cannot be considered "generation African" because he never lived or worked continuously in Angola.

There is still some work to architect Troufa Real, stressing among many, the project of a bank branch in Largo Maianga.

To end this tour by "African Generation" of Portuguese architects who have worked in Angola, it would be unfair to omit the architect Fernando Battle, the only one who at one time worked in heritage preservation, and his book "Architecture in Angola" will talk another time. This is a matter of utmost relevance come to be touched, any time soon, given the eagerness with which some vested interests are manifested by the "slaughter" of buildings, which are inseparable from the sustained growth history of the city, in certain periods of its history of centuries.

One day, Fernando Batalha, a nearly century architect and very lucid, will appear as a source of studies on the colonial era, having been the only one over 45 years in Angola, working on the property.

They say it was a lonely man who at the time, defended values discarded. Was writing these memories and continues to do so every day in an office where you can see the Tagus. He is the author of numerous publications on architecture, ethnography, history, and archeology.

It all began in January. º Cruise Vacation Students' Metropolis at Colonial, with a cultural director named Marcelo Caetano, who "told him to do many lectures and essays" during the trip. In the end, Fernando Battle let himself enchanted by Africa. He stayed. 1935: "There was only in Luanda century architecture. XVII, XVIII and XIX. From the century. XX, nothing! The city had no paved streets or sewage system. He took to bathing with a bucket of holes, from where he pulled a twine to leave yellow water. "

Had meetings marked. With the king of Congo, D. Peter VII, when, in 1942, showed him the debris of the first church of the Portuguese city of San Salvador (1491), now M'banza Congo. "It was old man, but nice and friendly, simple in dress," recalls Fernando Battle, who later learned of the site have turned airstrip.

Longevity has made it a living voice of history. He was among the first architects to step on the former colony, which led to immediate calls and work done. But the stop-start development takes young people to compete for South Africa in World War II, given the lack of technicians, called to combat. "The intelligence was operating in Angola, a bridge between Europe and Africa, and 'they' wanted to examine my condition. But when it comes to authorization, since the war ended, and the architects were in their posts."

He was grateful to fate. "I did not like, despite the South African cities are highly developed. When the Boers won the elections in 1948, lived in a guerrilla war without weapons, because the population was accustomed to the English, more lenient. There was open communication between ethnic. In Angola, the coexistence was different. “He walked a lot.”I visited the sites where there was the Portuguese presence. I confirmed ruins missing information gathered. I have a list of what there was." Was concerned with saving buildings, classifying all that way, restored what they could. Had problems because he wants to preserve centuries-old homes that were destroyed in Luanda. All documentation is on its enviable file.

The great work comes after the war. "The price of coffee has risen greatly. The Americans, who did the Vietnam War with stimulants, continued to drink coffee when they returned home. Europeans also. And Luanda begins to grow with private investment." And official. "Salazar did not want Angola to stay behind other colonies. He made the port of Luanda, roads, school buildings, finance with four floors, and opened up construction neighborhoods for whites and blacks."

Time to write, so do not miss. "At the time, not giving me work, but had an office in the palace with beautiful view to the garden of the governor. There were editors or readers, but took notes and wrote articles and short essays."

The interventions were in the hundreds. Engaged in land development plans, expansion of commerce and palaces of governors, launching offices in Angola. When age 75 came to Lisbon, he left the inventory of assets of the new country. A numerical palindrome of stay (1938-1983) in Angola did - you go through ancient times and continue, after independence, to transmit knowledge as a professor in the Faculty of Architecture of Luanda.

You have to edit the original seven. "I just wanted to live up to the launch of the forthcoming book, The Historical Populations of Angola." Frail but confident voice, he lives surrounded Battle of maps, old files and projects. He writes on yellow leaves, perhaps coming from Africa.

This "Africa" Generation are also included painters such as: Abel Manta, Almada Negreiros, António Quadros, Dórdio Gomes, Henry Medina, Isolino Vaz, Jaime Isidoro, John Hogan, Júlio Resende, Lourdes Castro, Manuel Pereira da Silva, among others; sculpture, highlight: Arlindo Rocha, Henrique Moreira, Leopoldo de Almeida, Manuel Pereira da Silva e Sousa Caldas.

In 1955, Manuel Pereira da Silva designed the statue of Ulysses S. Grant, 18th U.S. president won the tender launched for that purpose by the Ministry of Overseas, erected opposite the building of the Town Hall of Bolama, in Guinea-Bissau.

Ulysses Grant was an American general and statesman, born in 1822 and died in 1885. Walked in the Mexican War in 1847 and actively participated in the Civil War, fighting alongside the Northerners, having given the coup de grace in the Southern 1865. Candidate for U.S. president, won overwhelmingly, and ruled from 1868 to 1876, as 18th President. From 1877 to 1880 made a triumphal trip around the world, where he was always warmly received. "
"For it was this famous statesman who openly defended the possession of Guinea to Portugal. In memory of someone, being large, generously learned advocate a just cause, the Government commissioned the Portuguese Manuel Pereira da Silva their statue, despite the Guinean revolutionary winds of independence, is still in place. "

In 1960, Manuel Pereira da Silva performed, "Africa", this low-relief, polychrome faience, for the decoration of the facade of a building situated on the waterfront of the Bay of Luanda, Angola. To this end Manuel Pereira da Silva improvised studio in a vacant industrial collection, on the outskirts of Porto.

This with the bas-relief of the Palace of Justice had the same treatment bas-relief running to Angola where there are plenty of geometric shapes. Figures of the Gentiles, plants and animals are on the immense work in a modern design that Manuel Pereira da Silva sought to impose on their works.

Sculpture in Portugal in the XX century (1910 - 1960)

Lúcia Almeida Matos is an Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Fine Arts, University of Porto (FBAUP), graduated in Philosophy in the Faculty of Arts, University of Porto, obtained the degree of Master of Arts (MA) and Master of Philosophy (MPhil) at Syracuse University (USA) and his doctorate from the Faculty of Fine Arts, University of Porto.

Develops research work and teaching in History and Theory of Modern and Contemporary Art, and Museology. Directs the Museum of FBAUP coordinating the publication of a bulletin of the museum and museum and exhibition projects. He has organized scientific meetings and international exhibitions commissioner.

The bibliographic series "Texts University of Social Sciences and Humanities" is proposed to publish important works in a field of knowledge in modern critical studies that fit also valuable classical culture. Many of these investigations are going counter to the contemporary technocratic tendencies, just facing the problems, perceived as larger, quantitative. The return to classical sources of knowledge must be the universal characteristic sign of a new Humanism.

This philosophy inspires and guides the program of this series of doctrinal issues, whose responsibility fell to the defunct National Institute of Scientific Research and the Foundation for Science and Technology wishes to pursue, in partnership with the Calouste Gulbenkian.

This book reproduces, with slight adjustments, the text of a PhD thesis that Lucia Almeida Matos defended at the Faculty of Fine Arts, University of Porto in November 2003. Within three years that separates the public presentation of the dissertation and the publication of this book in 2007, published by the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation and the Foundation for Science and Technology, the international and national literature was naturally enriched.

In the Preface of this book, authored by Professor Raquel Henrique da Silva, responsible for scientific guidance, "Sculpture in Portugal in the twentieth century (1910-1969) has the evident marks of having been written for doctoral dissertation. But, unlike the usual connotations in connection with such type of work, the book presented here is extremely accessible read, clear in its organization and, I think, interesting for several reasons. However, it has considerable critical apparatus, and collapsed into footnotes, and a laudable ambition. In summary, Lúcia Almeida Matos held an in-depth research and extension on the Portuguese sculpture, through journeys and works of the artists in this area, stood out among the early twentieth century and the 1960s. To select, analyze and enhance naturally had to respond to successive cultural contexts of our recent history, linking it with the ever dynamic international (mainly European) that were influencing. The purpose of tracing the history of nineteenth-century Portuguese sculpture in dialogue with several crucial scenes of art - the French in the early decades, English, in the past, still considering illuminating markings of Catalonia and Italy in the '30s and '40s - is the fact that differentiates this work and become a mandatory reference in our art history. "

The methodology followed by Lúcia Almeida Matos does not, however, only bring the history of Portuguese sculpture of the twentieth century as a specific reality but part and parcel of European sculpture from the same time. She allowed two broad conclusions that should be highlighted.

The first is that, unlike opinions less reasoned and more ideological, the then Portuguese sculptors (including youth of 1960 who, fortunately still active today) contacted with the disruptions of sculptural practice in the time they were occurring, nor more late or earlier than the other national schools. However, in the years 1900 to 1920, this attention to modernity was conducted in a marked fidelity to the models of teaching and academic output without reaching the avant-garde practice that at the time, they rarely are public recognition. Comparing with the painting, it may be said that there was, in sculpture, an Amadeo de Souza Cardoso, and the sculptor who most comes to him (by attention to the international scene where he worked with recognized success) was the modernist Ernesto Canto Maia. By contrast, in 1960, the young Portuguese sculptors entered with enthusiasm and commitment in the field of artistic vanguards then, mainly through London, though, in developing their careers do not always have remained uncertain in this taut string which is the novelty.

The second conclusion is that this book proposes that, contrary to what was intended (in political and ideological), the least interesting period of twentieth century sculpture is the Portuguese of the 30s and 40s, who, paradoxically, would, in desiring words of António Ferro, the "golden age" of the National Sculpture. The sculptors were dominated by activity in excess of orders for content monumental quite outdated, less traveled, did not receive grants processing abroad (unlike its predecessors and successors) and surrendered, more or less, the intent of celebratory nationalist content .

But beyond the depth of history, the book addresses topics Lúcia Almeida Matos ever in Portugal, had been treated and which relate to the field theory of sculpture. This applies to the special constrangements craft, regarding, for example, greater autonomy of the painting, determining the sculptor's face heavy reliance on technology and order, but in the territory of output to the situation, the author introduces the fundamental distinction between the large and small format, which is the best way to research and innovation. These issues are very important in the transition between the nineteenth and twentieth century, when Rodin was the most beloved master of sculpture in Europe. One of the most innovative contributions of this dissertation is to examine how the complexity of that time, distinguishing, effectively, the fields of modernity and vanguard. Regarding the difficult period of 30 years and 40 pages devoted to aesthetic and monumental sculpture and the differentiation between office is bright, and the approach to the ideological future of art in the service of a story of heroes. Indeed, the subchapter "Rise and fall of a statue" suggest the continued relevance of this original research that combines art and urban space in the complex contexts of the most intense vibrations and ruptures of history.

The proposed study of sculpture in Portugal in the period called the modern consensus, that is, until the moment when the very concept of sculpture is called into question by imposing and simultaneously assuming a paradigm shift. The late 60s was then taken as the chronological limit of this work, since, together with the international art scene, those were the years that marked the first major changes in practice and theoretical reflection of Portuguese artists working in the country, or beneficial internships abroad.

The third part of this book is to emphasize that we want and that fits with the purpose of this blog of art, to study and investigate the work of the sculptor Manuel Pereira da Silva. This Part III has the theme "From 1949 to 1969: From the office to sculpture" and is the second chapter: "First disruptions" in subchapter "Neo-realism in general exhibitions of plastic arts" that comes the first reference to Manuel Pereira da Silva. In 1946, Portugal José Augusto France as he admitted "it was necessary to support the neo-realism, even if in ignorance of anything else.

The neo-realism mark out of modernism, which considers formal, empty, and outdated, a very different era, that the divorce with eager real, that should belong to the past, and which also includes surrealism through all phases of modern art, it is noted a common aversion to reality. Creating another reality, here, in outline, the thesis of the table-object claimed by Cubism. Creating another reality, to capture "surreal," a reality get "total", is the obsession of the surrealists. All large and small shocks of modern art are generally seen as revolutions. But according to Júlio Pomar, we must distinguish revolutions only within the plane of modern art to modern art ever surpassed its status as art for a circle and hence its crisis, the result is a vicious circle.

The birth of a neo-realistic expression in the arts happens first, to a certain theoretical level, with features manifest in the pages of new journals, including The Devil and the Rising Sun, is gaining artistic form, particularly in painting, student initiatives Fernando de Azevedo, Julio Pomar. Marcelino Vespereira and others, in Lisbon on 42, then the shares of Julio Pomar and Victor Palla in Independent Exhibition in Oporto on 44, with an issue at the Instituto Superior Técnico in the following year. The year 1946 will be the decisive year in the formation of motion, the décor of the Cinema Batalha, Porto, by Júlio Pomar, the exhibition at the Athenaeum Commercial Port and finally, I General Exhibition of Fine Arts at the National Society of Fine Arts.

In 1946, inaugurate, as two exhibitions, one in Porto and Lisbon in the other, both "freely and independently organized by the artists themselves, who came to work" as stones were thrown onto the surface of a lake parade, "according to Adolfo Casais Monteiro. In the spirit of what many would assume already so distant that they could not recover it, the participating artists exhibited in unity, reminding the independent initiatives of 30 and presenting an alternative model to the usual division between "San Pedro de Alcantara" and "Barata Salgueiro ". It was the spring I Exhibition, opened at the Athenaeum Comercial do Porto, June 15, and R General Exhibition of Fine Arts, the National Society of Fine Arts, the following month.

In a speech that accompanied the exhibition, with the title "Art and Youth", Júlio Pomar reminded young people that "art is the earth, puts down roots in life" and that, in addition to "reflect the rhythm of life" can still "contribute to accelerate this pace." Other lectures on "Painting and Cinema", "Art and Audience" and "Urban Planning and Architecture" shows the ambition of reflection and questioning of the initiative.

The general press has reported extensively from Porto whole event in general noting the comprehensive nature of the exhibition, which included "artists categorized and some that are still early in his career, documenting various genres from classical to pure Modernist stranger." According to art criticism, sculpture displayed in the exhibition was "balanced" and indicated power "to get very far." Were highlighted Eduardo Tavares, Mário Truta, Margaret Shimmelpfenning, Augusto Gomes, Cruz Caldas, Herculano Monteiro and Manuel Pereira da Silva.

In the catalog I General Exhibition of Fine Arts in Lisbon, it is recommended not to put aside some puzzlement by "an apparent lack of unity" that the diversity of the works on display may appear, and before that turns attention "to the intentions of the show "to promote cooperation among the artists who" want to serve not only the life, savor it, enjoy it, but to serve it, improve it, make it worth living.”

The exhibition is received by art critics in a favorable way that highlights the "sense of solidarity" of artists; it seemed to him the cooperation "a wonderful lesson" and welcomes the fact that it may appear a "regular comparison of several trends from different generations.”

In the subchapter "The abstraction and exposures independent" appears several references to Manuel Pereira da Silva. The abstract art, specifically painting, signed in Portugal in June 1935, on the screens of Maria Helena Vieira da Silva, on display in Gallery UP, by António Pedro as "the first exhibition of abstract paintings that are done in Portugal since the time of Amadeo de Souza Cardoso.” By the way still painting Vieira da Silva (and Arpad Szenes), Joao Gaspar Simões explain, at 36, be "the ultimate stage of pictorial expression which disowned the sensible reality" and cites André Lhote to designate the "abstract".

The abstract art is historically linked to the Portuguese independent exhibitions, whose main organizer and entertainer, Fernando Lanhas, coincidentally is the central figure of this abstraction. After a I Exhibition in April 1943, the premises of the School of Fine Arts in Porto, where they already can check the presence of the future "hard core" of independent, such as Julio Resende, Fernando Fernandes, Nadir Afonso, Arlindo Rocha Altino Maia, Mário Truta, Serafim Teixeira, Augusto Tavares and Manuel Pereira da Silva. The exhibitions are independent to take place outside the school and several times outside of Porto in the first example of decentralization and will broadcast that, despite everything, will not avoid a certain marginalization of artists of the Port regarding events and initiatives greater visibility and impact of the capital.

The Independent Exposure II is presented in February 1944, the Athenaeum Commercial Port and is from there that the action of Fernando Lanhas will be felt in the consistent quality of the catalogs and mounts exhibitions, as well as with the persistence in keep alive the initiatives. In this exhibition of sculptures were present Altino Maia, Arlindo Rocha, Eduardo Tavares, Joaquim Meireles, Manuel Monteiro da Cunha, Maria Graciosa de Carvalho, Mário Truta, M. Felix de Brito, Manuel Pereira da Silva, and Serafim Teixeira.

The Independent Exposure III takes place in the same year, the hall of the Coliseum of Oporto and those involved in the sculpture: Abel Salazar, Altino Maia, Antonio Azevedo, Arlindo Rocha, Eduardo Tavares, Henrique Moreira, Manuel Pereira da Silva, Mário Truta, and Sousa Caldas. In the exhibition catalog, roaming in Coimbra in January 1945, it was clarified that the name of "independent" is not a name at random, but involves the awareness that art is a world heritage site and hence our very varied presence it being understood that this should wake up to underpin the future, one cannot deny the right of the month noted.

Unlike what happens with the Surrealist exhibitions or general, much identified with neo-realism, the flag of abstraction will not be held independent exhibitions, which merely incorporate abstract experiences of their increasingly numerous followers.

A more refined and homogeneous III Exhibition that will be presented, also 45, in Leiria and Lisbon, where he criticized the emerging neo-realist.

Twitter of the sculptor Manuel Pereira da Silva is the Portuguese most followed

According to the blog eMuseu, the Twitter of sculptor Manuel Pereira da Silva is the Portuguese that has more followers ... curious.

Contemporary Artists

Jean-Pierre Blanchon, a Frenchman in love with painting, wrote a book with the quotations of 1500 Portuguese artists, the Quotation Portuguese Artists in Auction - Guide 2006/2010 (Author's edition). The author has an antique shop in the Chiado area and an auction house.

Once arrived in Portugal in 1991, lived up to his addiction to not lose any auction. Economist by training, the lack of data for cataloging artists bothered him. He went to work: analyzing auction catalogs, able to evaluate the evolution of 50 Portuguese Painters between 1974 and 1994. He concluded that only the investment in stock market had gotten over the average return of Portuguese paintings in this period - whose values ranged between 6.6% and -2.8% - relative to inflation.

In this guide we can see that the sculptor Manuel Pereira da Silva scored 10 of his contemporary paintings at auction, during the referred period (2006-2010), was sold 7 paintings in Watercoulor.

Art Auction

Palácio do Correio Velho Art Auction House, sold four compositions with Mixed Media, a Gouache composition and a Charcoal composition of the Sculptor Manuel Pereira da Silva in the Contemporary Painting Auction.

Contemporary Painting Auction

The Sculptor Manuel Pereira da Silva was represented on the Auction of Modern and Contemporary Art, held at Palácio do Correio Velho, with an oil painting on canvas, two Mixed Media compositions and a Watercolour composition.

Three sculptors with value

The publication of this literary work is biographical and critical and is related to three sculptors from Avintes, Portugal, named António de Sá Fernandes, Henrique Moreira and Manuel Pereira da Silva - three glories of our land.

Julio Pomar - Abstract Expressionism

Born in 1926 in Lisbon, and set up in Paris in 1963. Currently lives and works in Paris and Lisbon. Attended the School of Decorative Arts Antonio Arroio and the Schools of Fine Arts of Lisbon and Porto, in 1942 and participated in a first group in Lisbon, and made the first solo exhibition in 1947, in Porto. Devoted himself particularly to painting, but his work also includes works of drawing, engraving, sculpture and "assemblage, illustration, ceramics, tapestries and scenery for theatre.

Has, also, works of decorative tile mural for the station in the Windmill High Lisbon Metropolitan, (1983-84), the Circus of Brasilia (Gran'Circolar, 1987), the Station of the Metro Jardin Botanique in Brussels (1992) the Court of Moita (“Justice of Solomon ', 1993) and the train station of Corroios (1998). Participated in the Biennale de São Paulo, 1953, and also in the editions of 1975 and 1985. The Gulbenkian Foundation in 1978 organized the first retrospective of his work, which was exhibited in Lisbon, Porto and Brussels. In 1986, a new retrospective exhibition was presented by the museums of the Gulbenkian Foundation in São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro and Brasilia and also at its headquarters in Lisbon.

Camões, 1988

Other exhibitions anthology of thematic scope took place in 1990, works with themes of Brazil, in Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo and Lisbon, in 1991, with paintings and drawings on literary subjects and portraits of writers (Pomar et la Literature), in Charleroi, Belgium

Edgar Poe, Fernando Pessoa e o Corvo, 1985

in 1997 with work on the theme of D. Quixote, in Cascais, and paintings on the Indians of Brazil, in Biarritz, France. Other anthologies of paintings were presented in 1999 and 2000 in Macau and Beijing, in 2001, in Aveiro (Recent Paintings), and in 2003 in Istanbul. Published in 2002, the volume of tests "and then painting?" And in 2003 the poem "TRATAdoDITOeFeito. Exhibited new paintings (Méridiennes - Meres indienne), in 2004, Patrice Trigano Gallery, Paris, and the Sintra Museum of Modern Art - Berardo Collection presented a retrospective of his work organized by Marcelin Pleynet under the title "Autobiography", where out the first part of a series of sculptures in bronze. Also in 2004, the CCB has set out an anthology of recent works entitled 'Human Comedy'. The first two volumes of the catalogue "raisonné 'of works of painting, sculpture and assemblages of iron were published in 2001 and 2004, the Éditions de la Difference, Paris.

Gadanheiro, 1945

Orchard has become a strong opponent to the fascist regime. Joined the Movement of Democratic Unity (MUD) and participated in student fights, which cost him the expulsion of ESBAP. The political activism is also reflected in his work. In painting, in works such as The Gadanheiro, exposed in 1945 the National Society of Fine Arts, the texts published in newspapers, which advocated a neo-realist aesthetic, and the promotion of the 1st Exhibition of the spring Ateneu Comercial do Porto in 1946.

Almoço do trolha, 1946

In 1947 organized the 1st solo exhibition of drawings, in Porto. However, the mural that runs the Cinema Batalha was ruined by the PIDE.

Cegos de Madrid, 1957

Soon after leaving the port, returning to the capital. There was jailed for four months and saw your picture in the Resistance be confiscated II General Exhibition of Plastic Arts of the National Society of Fine Arts in 1947.

Maria da Fonte, 1957

Fernando Lanhas changed the art scene at the end of the 2nd War

Fernando Lanhas, (born Oporto, 16 September 1923) is a Portuguese painter and architect. He studied architecture but became known as the leading name in Portuguese abstract painting. He started painting in 1944, influenced by music, astronomy, and the international abstract movement. Since then, he's been one of the most innovative and original Portuguese painters.




In the years spent in Oporto School of Fine Arts was a student attentive and engaged. In this institution addressed the Group of Students of Fine Arts. Had Colleagues such as Nadir Afonso, Manuel Pereira da Silva and Julio Pomar, with whom talked about art. He began painting figurative paintings, which quickly turned into abstract works. Involved in the organization of the Independents Exhibition, in 1944, and collaborated on the page "Art" of the daily newspaper of Oporto, "The Afternoon" in 1945. Shortly travelled to Paris, where he visited and enjoyed the Art of major events such as Sallon des Réalité Nouvelles, in 1947.

In the field of the drawing, he is in the large family of modern design, combining the ability to express the virtuosity of form.
Pure Design, in search of an asceticism which always renders, the drawing as a mean and end in itself.
Stripped of any accessory, its design leads us through a firm registration, but with a ductility open to higher sensitivities. The fascination leads us to believe that the design is where does not exist!




His called abstract painting, reduced to a few colours and minimal shapes, carries the same fascination and meditation on the same scales of time and space that Fernando Lanhas. research in the scientific field. Some canvas came from graphic compositions, other, denser and unexplained, more metaphysical then geometric, pursuing the movement of natural forces and forms, the dimensions of the cosmos. Sometimes symbolic representations cease guess: sun, tree, bird.


His involvement with the Independents Exhibition, who changed the art scene at the end of the 2nd War, promoting the debate on the abstraction along with the first neo-realistic statements. At 45, working with J. Lanham Pomar and V. Palla in the organization of the page 'Art' of the daily 'The Afternoon', of Oporto (which is itself listed in the catalogues of 49-50), where the future Surrealists Cesariny, Oom and Vespeira also defended the 'useful arts'. Lanhas then publishes studies for Drums (Old with Handkerchief) and Old White, which forms the set of paintings, is now exposed. Later works are abstractions and provide the first evidence of the ambitions of the painter and the debate about the social implications of art, which is represented by The Artist Abstract (only shown in photo) and Catherine (The Magnificent ugliness) of 46; Lanhas visit Paris on 47 and returns to abstractionism.

Honorary member of the National Academy of Fine Arts, a man of rare culture, has acknowledged taking a journey of original demand of rationality in art. In a time of tension in encysted cultural crisis of the subject, has been able to understand it as a learning experience for the integration of man in the world, the inevitable game of ephemeral passions and affections.