Amadeo de Souza Cardoso was an artist who created his own pictorial language by rejecting labels and constantly seeking change and freedom.The Portuguese artist was present at the center of modern art and avant-garde ideas, thus having the opportunity for his works to be influenced by all artistic movements of the 20th century, from impressionism, fauvism, cubism to futurism. His colorful and dynamic works have been shown at salons in Paris, Hamburg, Cologne, Berlin, New York, Chicago, London and other cities.
Who was Amadeo de Souza Cardoso?
Amadeo Ferreira de Souza Cardoso was born on November 14, 1887. He attended preparatory studies in Amarante until 1901 and in the following year, he began his studies in Coimbra. It is in this city that he met and became a friend of Manuel Laranjeira, who introduced him to the small literary and artistic circle with romantic lines and the Portuguese Renaissance, which included the presence of Teixeira de Pascoaes, José de Barros, António Carneiro, Ramiro Mourão, Eurico Pousada, Pedro Blanco, Miguel de Unamuno and Augusto Santo. In 1905, with the intention of becoming an architect, his artistic vocation took him to the Drawing course at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Lisbon. However, at the end of the first academic year, he returned to Amarante and never returned to the Portuguese Academy. The rather conservative artistic environment in Portugal aroused interest in Paris. In the first decade of the 20th, movements such as Cubism and Fauvism flourished, which inspired Amadeu Souza-Cardoso to dedicate himself to drawing and painting and ended up abandoning the idea of being an architect. At the end of 1908, he began to divulge his caricature work in Portuguese newspapers such as “O Primeiro de Janeiro”, “Popular Illustration”, “Portuguese Illustration”, “Moda Ilustrada” and “Mundo Elegante” and also at this time, in the Crèmerie Chaude, he met the young Lucie Pecetto, his companion for life.
less lévriers inAmadeo de Souza-Cardoso
From 1912 onwards, there was a change in the Portuguese painter's graphics, which became bolder and more iconographic due to the influences ofpublication of the Futurist Manifesto, by Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, in the newspaper Le Figaro and the presentation of the Ballets Russes by Sergei Diaghilev, at the Théâtre du Châtelet in 1909.Between 1911 and 1912, he presented the first works of the new style at the XXVIII Salon des Indépendants, which were entitled “Les poissons d'or”, “La panthère” and “Cavaliers”, and produced a joint exhibition with Modigliani, thus becoming known among the modern Parisian community. In the following year, he participated in the 1st Salon of October in Berlin and in the Armory Show, in New York, with eight works, an exhibition that was repeated in Chicago and Boston.
Internationalization, in life, ended with the London Salon of the Allied Artists' Association in 1914, where he exhibited paintings with a colorful palette like Kandinsky and a figurativism close to Cubism that seduced critics. It is easily identified in his works the strong influences of the various artistic currents of the Parisian context, such as Cubism, Orphism, Futurism and Abstractionism, synthesizing and transforming them into a distinctive and distinctive language.
Avant-Garde Strawberryby Amadeo Souza-Cardoso, 1916
The Modern Artist
Taken by surprise by World War I, the painter and his wife returned to Portugal. War times were particularly difficult for the arts, however the artist continued to promote his works and created a new publication. During this period, Amadeo de Souza-Cardoso he was eager to return to Paris, however, in early 1918, the eczema disease that had affected his face and hands since he was a child returned. This illness prevented him from painting in oil and later, pneumonia, which ended up killing the painter. Despite the few years of life, his artistic production was extensive, and his works are on display in several national and international museums.
Stronghold inAmadeo de Souza-Cardoso, 1912