13 April, Matosinhos Town Hall; 14 and 15 April, Soares dos Reis National Museum
As part of the celebrations of the centenary of the death of Aurélia de Souza, the Salão Nobre da Câmara Municipal de Matosinhos hosts yesterday, April 13th, the first of three days of the "International Congress Aurélia de Souza. Women Artists in 1900".
The Mayor of the Matosinhos City Hall, Luísa Salgueiro, opened the event yesterday morning, which will continue on the 14th and 15th April in the auditorium of the Soares dos Reis National Museum.
Raquel Henriques da Silva, from the Instituto de História da Arte (IHA) of the Faculdade de Ciências Sociais e Humanas da Universidade Nova de Lisboa, and António Ponte, from the Soares dos Reis National Museum were also present at the opening session.
Luísa Salgueiro referred to the vast programme that integrates the celebrations of the centenary of the death of Aurélia de Souza, highlighting the joint work of the various institutions involved. "I am proud to be able to, humbly and through joint work, promote a figure as unavoidable as Aurélia de Souza".
The day's work was followed by the panel "Aurélia por Aurélia", moderated by Raquel Henriques da Silva.
This international congress is a unique opportunity to present not only Aurélia de Souza's work and her role as a woman-artist, in the light of the interpretation of several national and international researchers, but also to get to know other women artists forgotten by History and Art History.
Aurélia de Souza (1866-1922) is one of the most striking personalities of Portuguese art in the transition from the 19th to the 20th century. Her work assumes some of the great themes of European painting of the period, with emphasis on the continued practice of self-portraiture and self-representation that extends to the construction of pictorial narratives involving the family home and its people. Another original aspect of Aurélia's work is the practice of photography as a component, with a remarkable degree of autonomy, of the work of painting.
Aurélia was a brilliant student of the Oporto Academy of Fine Arts and completed her education with a stay in Paris where she attended the Académie Julian (accompanied by her sister, also a painter, Sofia de Souza). Well connected to the artistic and cultural milieu of Oporto, she also participated in exhibitions in Lisbon, with a determined attitude to assert herself as a professional painter in a predominantly male environment in which women artists should not aspire to anything more than the benevolent status of amateurs.
It is worth remembering that the Matosinhos City Hall, part of the commemorations, has already presented, in 2022, the exhibition "Aurélia de Souza. Do que vejo" at Quinta de Santiago Museum and currently has several works from its collection exhibited at Soares dos Reis National Museum, in the exhibition dedicated to the artist, "Aurélia de Souza, Vida e Segredo" open until May 21st.
More information and full programme of the "International Conference Aurélia de Souza. Women Artists in 1900" at https://aureliadesousa.weebly.com/
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