‏‏‎ The Cycle of the Master's room

The specificity of Portuguese 17th century azulejos, painted by artisans and quite expressively but naively executed, led to the commission from Holland of figurative panels, both religious and profane. The only colour used in Dutch tiles was blue, which was highly prestigious due to its connotation with China porcelain. Nevertheless, the undeniable technical quality of Dutch tiles did not suffice to make them a lasting fixture with the Portuguese, once they had found here in Portugal in the transition from the 17th to the 18th century new solutions for their sumptuary ceramic revetment needs. The actual painting closely followed the engraved source and was considered cold by Portuguese sensibility, and the fact that (despite the effort made in export panels) Dutch production was not geared to the ceramic revetment of large architectural expanses contributed to the end of the commissions. These were replaced by the work of a new generation of Portuguese painters who had received artistic training. It was the start of a new evolutionary period in Portuguese azulejos, still dominated by the painting of cobalt blue on white due to Dutch influence. During what became known as the Cycle of the Masters (1690-1725), the workshops tried to satisfy a more demanding clientele by producing figurative compositions characterised by a greater freedom in the use of engravings and by the creativity shown in adapting the panels to the areas to be clad. The azulejo painter, then, acquired the statute of an artist and often signed his panels, one of the most outstanding figures in this period being António de Oliveira Bernardes (active between 1699 and 1725). The precursor of this cycle was the Spanish Gabriel del Barco (active between 1669 and 1703) who introduced a taste for more exuberant decorative surroundings and a style of painting liberated from the strict contours of the drawing. Having introduced the Baroque to Portuguese azulejos other names within the Cycle of the Masters stood out, and like del Barco are also represented in the collection of the National Azulejo Museum. These include Manuel dos Santos (active between 1706 and 1723), the monogrammist P.M.P. (active between 1714 and 1725), and Policarpo de Oliveira Bernardes (active between 1717 and 1740). The figure of the azulejador or tile-layer, who was responsible for applying the now much more complex panels, grew in importance, establishing the contact between the commission and the workshop. The azulejos produced in Lisbon in the first decades of the 18th century also show greater accuracy in the elaboration of the iconographic programmes. In the Cycle of the Masters, after the work of Gabriel del Barco, these programmes acquired greater coherence, something lacking in the first 17th century narrative cycles, winning over figuration to spaces that until then were reserved solely for pattern azulejos.