Portuguese art history: a view from North America

Abstract

This essay is a four part series of comments on art history in the United States and Canada devoted to the Portuguese Renaissance and Early Modern periods. It examines the relative lack of emphasis on this subject by scholars of Iberian art whose principal focus has been on Spain. Some noteworthy exceptions are signaled, especially the outstanding contributions of Robert C. Smith in the areas of Portuguese (and Brazilian) painting, sculpture and architecture and that of George Kubler in the study of the so-called “Plain Style” of building. The work of more recent scholars is also discussed. The essay evaluates recent exhibitions that have featured Portuguese art and ends with a consideration of the particular meaning of the term “Baroque” within a Portuguese context, focusing on the achievements of the female artist Josefa de Ayala (1630-1684, also known as Josefa de Óbidos), the only Portuguese painter of the period to have had a one-artist exhibition in the United States.

Keywords

• Portuguese art
• Renaissance and Early Modern
• scholarship
• U.S. and Canada
• exhibitions
• Josefa de Ayala (Josefa de Óbidos)
• Baroque in Portugal
• Robert C. Smith
• George Kubler