Stories of the Collection IV

Spanning the period from 1983 to the present day, Stories of the Collection summarises key moments in the formation of the Caixa Geral de Depósitos (CGD) Collection. Across distinct points and through the presentation of its most important acquisitions, we follow the desires, tastes, policies and circumstances of each specific moment of the collection’s development: The Decorative Collection (1983-89); The Art Collection (1990-97); Diversification (2000-04); Photographs (1991 and 2004); Precision (2004-08 and 2014); Prints (2007); Donations and Bequests (1967-2021); Resuming Acquisitions (2020-21); New Acquisitions: renowned artists (2022 and 2023); New Acquisitions: mid-career artists (2022 and 2023); Caixa Contest for Young Artists (2022 and 2023).

The acquisition of a remarkable set of photographs by foreign photographers arose in two distinct moments under the guidance of Jorge Calado: in 1991, on the occasion of the exhibition Regards étranges (1930-1989) at the Musée de la Photographie in Mont-sur-Marchienne, Belgium, included in Europália'91 Portugal (21. 09 - 24.11.1991); and in 2005, on the occasion of the exhibition Dedans-Dehors, Le Portugal en Photographies | Olhares Estrangeiros - Fotografias de Portugal, presented at the Centre Culturel Calouste Gulbenkian, Paris (18.05 - 12.07.2005) and, later, at Fidelidade Mundial Chiado 8, Lisbon (29.11.2005 - 17.02.2006).

Regards étranges (1930-1989) featured photographs taken in Portugal by great non-Portuguese photographers. Featuring photographs from the National Photography Collection (currently part of the Portuguese Photography Centre in Porto), this exhibition was made viable with the patronage of CGD for the acquisition of a set of 26 photographs (mostly period proofs) by photographers such as Alma Lavenson, Brett Weston, Dick Arentz, Esther Bubley, Edouard Boubat, Godfrey Frankel, Harry Callahan, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Peter Fink and Tod Papageorge.

In 2005, at the invitation of the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, Jorge Calado organised the exhibition Dedans-Dehors at the Centre Culturel Calouste Gulbenkian (in Paris) with works from the CGD Collection around the theme "Portugal as seen by foreign photographers". Realising there were insufficient photographs in the collection, the CGD Board of Directors, at the proposal of Manuel Vaz, chairman of Culturgest, reinforced the collection with a set of 36 photographs by Cecil Beaton, David Stephenson, Emil Otto Hoppé, George Krause, Jim Cooke, John Davies, Kees Scherer, Laurent Millet, Leo Rubinfien, Richard Pare, Sarah Moon and Thurston Hopkins.

This group of photographs was shown in Portugal for the first time in the exhibition Olhares Estrangeiros at Fidelidade Mundial-Chiado 8. Jorge Calado also included in this particular exhibition works that already formed part of the contemporary collection by Portuguese artists such as Alberto Carneiro, José M. Rodrigues and Paulo Nozolino and by foreign artists such as Gérard Castello-Lopes and Mozambican photographer Ricardo Rangel.