Azulejos and Prints
Maria do Rosário Salema de Carvalho *
* Rede Temática em Estudos de Azulejaria e Cerâmica João Miguel dos Santos Simões - Instituto de História da
Arte da Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Lisboa / Thematic Network on the Study of Tiles and Ceramics
João Miguel dos Santos Simões – History of Art Institute, Faculty of Letters, University of Lisbon (Portugal). This
work was supported by Project PRINTART (PTDC/EEA-CRO/098822/2008)
Abstract
During five hundred years of using azulejos [tiles] in Portugal, that decorated walls and
vaults in churches or in palaces, the painters looked for inspiration in prints. These
compositions, however, were not copied, rather they were interpreted in a free way,
adapting scales, taking or adding figures, simplifying the background scenarios or making
them more complex, or even finding other appropriate solution. To acknowledge the
plurality of these interpretations is to recognize the usage of a common European visual
language, while noticing the inventive characteristics of Portuguese painters and their ability
to integrate tiles within architecture, metamorphosing the architectural spaces. In the last
few years, the studies on Portuguese tile paintings emphasized the relation with prints,
searching for the graphical source behind a given tile panel composition. However, we
require a deeper and more systematic evaluation of the relations between prints and tile
panels for enlightening the organization of the painter's work and how would they exploit
the prints, as well as to establish the cultural and visual context embedding the artists and
the orderings, which allows to relate the motivations shared by different kinds of artworks in
the same period.
This presentation will begin by presenting a short overview of tilemaking in Portugal,
focusing in the baroque period, whose tile panels were almost painted on blue and white
colours. Furthermore, we will show some examples of tile panels inspired by prints, calling
the attention to the importance of knowing the prints to interpret the iconographic program
of the tiles. On the other hand, we will refer to the research project PrintART that resulted
from a collaboration between the History of Art Research Group specialized in the study of
Portuguese tiles – Rede Temática em Estudos de Azulejaria e Cerâmica João Miguel dos
Santos Simões – and the Computer Vision researchers of the Institute for Systems and
Robotics [ISR] / Instituto Superior Técnico. Both institutions joined efforts to develop an
automatic tool that would assist the art historians in their work of looking for prints that
inspired tile panels by searching for matching shapes and compositions automatically.
Rosário Salema de Carvalho is a researcher at Rede Temática em Estudos de Azulejaria e
Cerâmica João Miguel dos Santos Simões [History of Art - Institute of Faculty of Letters from
the University of Lisbon] since October 2007, and coordinates the projects related to tile
studies and inventory, in collaboration with Museu Nacional do Azulejo and also with the
company “Sistemas do Futuro”, for the development of a database for tiles inventory. She
has been doing research on heritage, especially in the area of Portuguese tiles, and wrote
several books and articles. Her PhD dissertation in Art History, was dedicated to one of the
most significant periods of the history of Portuguese tiles, including the so called Masters’
Cycle (1675-1725).