The latest book I have read ...

I must admit my ignorance as to Henning Mankell, whose name I have to confess I had never heard of, until I read this incredibly honest and touching series of  memoirs, reflections and concerns with social justice amongst many other considerations gathered in "Quicksand - what it means to be a human being".

 

"Quicksand is an invaluable parting gift from a great man" who passed away in 2015  almost two years after having been diagnosed with cancer, but what makes it more invaluable is the fact that it makes us ponder on the way we, as humanity, have lived and continue to live ...




From among a number of sentences I copied down as I was reading the book I've decided to impart these.



"Over the years what one looks like in a mirror changes, but behind that mirror image is always the real you."



"Acknowledging one's fear of the unknown is realising what it means to be a person. Throughout our lives we strive to increase our knowledge, our abilities, our experiences. But the bottom line is that all of that will be lost in oblivion."



"Having the possibility to make decisions about what to do with one's life is a great privilege. As far as most people on this planet are concerned, life is simply about survival."












 

The latest film I have seen ...

Having been awarded the wining Oscar for best picture Moonlight is not an easy film to watch namely because it takes the viewer through three different stages in the life of a young man with all his struggles to emotionally survive a series of hardship circumstances and find himself  (even sexually) but more so because the cinematographic approach is so intimate that it is hard not to strongly feel the silences, the doubts and the drama of the main character of the film as the whole story unfolds. 

 

 

The number of issues it touches makes it a rather profound film one ought to ponder on.

 

 

 

 

The performances by Alex Hibbert, Ashton Sanders and Trevante Rhodes who play the role of the young man throughout his child, adolescent and adulthood stages are second to none, being only equalled by the performance of Mahershala Ali, a drug dealer who plays a rather unique role in the life of the young man, which has led him to a winning prize as well, despite the fact that the performing level of every single character is noteworthy.

 

 

 

 

Almada Negreiros temporary exhibition at Calouste Gulbenkian Museum, Lisbon (cont.) - The 19th of March 2017

(...)

I was particularly impressed with the pencil drawings, whose reproductions I had seen printed in various books before but the impact the real size ones had on me can't be described and before the exhibition leaves Calouste Gulbenkian Museum I feel I'll have to see it again and let myself be "taken" by Almada Negreiros again ...

 

1933 untitled graphite on paper (left).

 

 

 

 

1920 untitled graphite on paper (left). Untitled ballpoint pen on paper (right).

1940 untitled oil on canvas.

 

 

Game of cards - 1947 tempera on paper(left). 1948 untitled graphite on paper.

Three Graces - undated Indian ink and watercolour on paper.

 The Ironer - 1938 oil on canvas.

 

 

 

 

Maternity - 1935 oil on canvas

Self portrait in a group at Brasileira do Chiado Café - 1925 oil on canvas

Double portrait - 1934-36 oil on canvas

 

 

 

 

 

Double portrait - 1927 graphite on paper (left). Portrait of Almada Negreiros' mother - Undated graphite on paper

 Self portrait - Undated oil on canvas

Undated self portraits - Indian ink on paper.

 

 

 

 

 1940 self portrait - graphite on paper.

Aurora - 1945 oil on wood (right).

 

 

 

 

 

 

Undated graphite on paper.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Untitled 1939 graphite on paper (left). Untitled 1925 graphite on paper.

1929 untitled graphite on paper.

 

Almada Negreiros temporary exhibition at Calouste Gulbenkian Museum - The 19th of March 2017

 

 

To be modern is just like being elegant

It is not a way of dressing, but a way of being

To be modern is not to use the modern caligraphy

But to be the genuine discoverer of the new. 

 

José Almada Negreiros - 1927 Madrid Conference on Drawing

 

 

 

 

 

Almada Negreiros has always had a special place in my artistic preferences since an early age and if I question myself as to what really attracted me in those pencil drawing copies I first came across at my grandmother's I feel I would say it was the movement they conveyed ... I could almost see them coming out of the paper and that undoubtedly impacted my imagination. It wasn't but much later that I started reading some of his essays and a few years later came across his oil paintings and ceramic wall compositions. 

 

 

 

The very well organised temporary exhibition I've been to at Calouste Gulbenkian's Museum over the weekend brings together most of his works and is undeniably a must.

Nude (Painting for the Bristol Club) - 1926 oil on canvas.

Untitled (paintings for Alfaiataria Cunha tailor's, Lisboa) - 1913 oil on canvas.

 

 

Bathers (painting for Brasileira Café ) - 1925 Oil on canvas

 

 

 

 

 

 

1923 untitled watercolour on paper (left). 1931 untitled Indian Ink on paper (right).

1921 untitled Italian ink on paper.

Undated graphite on paper drawings.

Untitled (Harlequin, ballerina and horse) - 1953 oil on canvas (left). Untitled (Theme for a tapestry) - c.1954 gouache on cardboard (right).

 

 

 

 

 

Untitled (theme for tapestry for the Ritz Hotel) - 1959 oil on canvas.

 

 

 

 

 

Study for stained glass wall for the mortuary chapel in Our Lady of Fátima Church - 1938 gouache on paper glued on wood.

Study for stained glass wall for the Chorus of Our Lady of Fátima Church (rejected version) - c.1938

Study for panel mural (destroyed) for the Restauradores Post Office - 1940

(Commissioned painting to represent the revue Orpheu) Portrait of Fernando Pessoa - 1964 oil on canvas.

Reading Orpheu - 1954 Gouache, watercolour and ballpoint on paper

Study for a fresco mural for Diário de Notícias newspaper premises - 1939 gouache on cardboard.

 

 

 

Gouache on platex Tapestry exhibited at the Comptoir Suisse at the 1957  Lausanne Fair.

Oil on plywood study for the Auditing Court - 1974

Untitled graphite and aniline dye on paper

Portrait of Júlia Novais - 1927 gouache on paper (left). Portrait of Maria Madalena Moraes da Silva Amado with an inscription "Doux comme le violet, fou comme le vert"- 1921 watercolour on paper (right) 

1924 untitled gouache on paper.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1922 green ink on paper (left). Undated watercolour on paper (right).

 

 

Fish seller - 1924 watercolour on paper (left). 1922 untitled watercolour on paper (right). 

 

 

 

 

 

Untitled gouache on paper study (left). Weedpicker - 1936 oil on canvas (right)

 

 

 

(To be continued)