The ruined portrait and the body that looks at us

Abstract

This article discusses Olympia, the painting by Édouard Manet, and its copy by Guilherme de Santa-Rita presented at the Academia de Belas-Artes exhibition inaugurated the 18th of March, 1911. I believe that Santa-Rita’s painting must occupy a significant place in art historiography in Portugal, namely the history of Portuguese modernism. The article emphasizes the reception of Olympia’s copy presented precisely the day before the 1911 Free Exhibition.

Santa-Rita’s copy, regrettably forgotten nowadays, questioned Portuguese painting and the portrait genre in particular, namely their relation with human body at the beginning of the 20th century, as well as the overwhelming hypocrisy of the whole society. To remember this painting is essential for the history of portrait art in Portugal.