Almada in the city: assigment or work?
No. 21 (2017-07-01)Author(s)
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Ellen W. Sapega
Abstract
In 1969, while completing what would be his final work, the panel “Começar” found at the entrance to the Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Almada Negreiros observed that there are two types of works: those that belong to everyone and those that are commissioned to hang on the wall. No other Portuguese artist of the 20th century received as many commissions as Almada. His public art projects that include representations of quotidian experience can be found throughout the city, in the form of murals, stained glass windows, tapestries, etc. In this essay, I analyze the visual vocabulary present in some of Almada’s most important public art projects executed between 1938-1969, in an attempt to determine which of these works are perhaps mere “commissions” and which “belong to everyone.” In my opinion, the latter’s success lies in their ability to express a sense of vernacular culture (what social reality feels like) and to communicate a colloquial and vivid experience of the present.
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