It’s always puzzling to find out that famous painters abroad, in this case, in Portugal, can remain totally unknown in Paris and around the world. Amadeo de Souza-Cardoso died at 30 in 1918 after having lived in Paris for 8 years at the height of the Montparnasse artistic movement. A friend of Modigliani and Brancusi, he exhibited in Germany and at the Armory show in New York in 1913 but also at the French Salon in 1912.
His prime inspiration is nature and animals and some of the paintings at Grand Palais are completely surrealistic and/or naive. Cosponsored by the Foundation Calouste Gulbenkian, the show has taken Parisians by surprise and enchanted visitors.
He was elegant and behaved like a dandy in Paris or in Brittany where he went a few times. His friend poet Fernando Pessoa, describes him as « plural like the universe » with not one style but many surprising talents. Like the Delaunays, he uses color in many different ways. He illustrates extensively Flaubert’s « La légende de Saint Julien l’Hospitalier » in 1912. He died of the Spanish influenza in Manhufe, Portugal, and had never been shown in Paris since.
Grand Palais until July 18 th.
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