How Lisbon's Maritime Station Murals Survived Censorship
José de Almada Negreiros's artwork pushed back against the Portuguese dictatorship–but escaped destruction despite the controversy they provoked.
Salazar delivering a speech by Horácio NovaisWorld Monuments Fund
When António de Oliveira Salazar took power in Portugal in 1933, he ushered in what would become one of Europe’s longest-running authoritarian governments.
His Estado Novo, or “new state,” proclaimed Catholicism as the national religion, suppressed dissent, and tightly controlled freedom of expression.
Salazar posting for a bust by the sculptor Francisco Franco (no relation to the Spanish dictator of the same name) as propaganda minister António Ferro looks on (1936)World Monuments Fund
Under the leadership of António Ferro, state-sponsored culture offered a rosy image of the country and its traditions. The emphasis on certain features of traditional architecture in modern commissions led to the emergence of an architectural style known as “Português Suave.”
When the government decided to modernize the port of Lisbon and build two new marine stations to receive newly arrived travelers, it was another potential opportunity to project a grand image of the nation to the world.
From the triptych Here Comes the Nau Catrineta That Has a Lot to Tell (1943-4) by José de Almada NegreirosWorld Monuments Fund
One might expect that the murals at an important site like the marine stations would follow the pattern of artworks celebrating the nation and its historic heroes.
But in many ways, José de Almada Negreiros, the Portuguese-Santomean avant-garde artist selected for the commission, was able to subtly subvert the dominant narrative favored by the dictatorship.
Rather than offering a heroic depiction of Portugal, Almada Negreiros’s paintings focus on everyday people and their struggles. This can be seen particularly clearly in his depictions of dockworkers, many of whom undertook heavy physical labor for low pay. Such imagery evokes the socialist realist tradition.
Another dominant theme of Almada Negreiros’s murals is emigration, hinting at a degree of poverty and economic malaise that the government would probably have preferred not to draw attention to.
RMS Caronia at Alcântara Station by Horácio NovaisWorld Monuments Fund
In fact, with the outbreak of World War II, emigration would become a central part of the marine stations' stories as Jews and other persecuted people from across Europe fled through neutral Portugal to safety.
David Harris
CEO, American Jewish Committee
Saltimbancos (1948) by José de Almada NegreirosWorld Monuments Fund
Almada Negreiros’s murals received backlash immediately upon their unveiling, including from those in the government. Duarte Pacheco, the minister of public works, decried the Alcântara murals as “eyesore.” Salazar solicited the opinions of his advisers on what should be done.
Discovery of the Land (1941-2) by Candido PortinariWorld Monuments Fund
Internal discussions of Almada Negreiros's work unfavorably referenced the Brazilian artist Candido Portinari, a communist whose focus on proletarian subjects upended typical imperialist heroic narratives. To those in power, styles and subject matter like this bore potentially dangerous elements of dissent.
Interior of Rocha do Conde de Óbidos Station (1982) by Estúdio Mário NovaisWorld Monuments Fund
It was only thanks to the fact that Almada Negreiros's murals found favor with certain key figures among Salazar's advisers–including the minister of propaganda–that they were not destroyed.
Today, Almada Negreiros is recognized as one of the most significant figures in Portuguese modernism, and the maritime station murals are among his most important projects.
Departure of Steamship with Emigrants (1948) by José de Almada NegreirosWorld Monuments Fund
The Portuguese art critic José-Augusto França wrote of the two triptychs in Rocha do Conde d'Óbidos Station that “in one, [we see] the drama of emigration, exiting harbour, in an old boat, where sweat and grease can be smelled…”
Saltimbancos (1948) by José de Almada NegreirosWorld Monuments Fund
“…in the other, the Lisbon that stays, with its Sunday pleasures, in a modest sadness passed in boredom and wonder, gently, in a time that stood still.”
View from Alcântara by APL – Port of Lisbon AuthorityWorld Monuments Fund
Despite the controversy surrounding their beginnings, Almada Negreiros’s murals remain in the stations to this day–artworks that, in the words of scholar Paula Ribeiro Lobo, continue to evoke “the departure and the void of staying, inscribed on a monumental scale in a collective memory space that would relate to other future painful departures and arrivals.”
dos Santos, Mariana Pinto. "On Being Modern: Possibilities of Resistance through Primitivism and Ingenuousness in Ernesto de Sousa and Almada Negreiros." RIHA Journal (2016).
Gil, Milene, Mafalda Costa, Mila Cvetkovic, Carlo Bottaini, Ana Margarida Cardoso, Ana Manhita, Cristina Barrocas Dias, and António Candeias. "Unveiling the Mural Painting Art of Almada Negreiros at the Maritime Stations of Alcântara (Lisbon): Diagnosis Research of Paint Layers as a Guide for Its Future Conservation." Ge-conservacion 20 (2021): 105-117.
Lobo, Paula Ribeiro. "Almada and the Maritime Stations." Revista de História da Arte–série W 2 (2014): 342-352.
Monteiro, João Pardal. "Porfírio Pardal Monteiro and the Global Design." docomomo journal 55 (2016): 24-29.
Sapega, Ellen W. Consensus and Debate in Salazar's Portugal: Visual and Literary Negotiations of the National Text, 1933–1948. Vol. 8. Penn State Press, 2008.
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