page_title: Portuguese Renaissance
section_title: Painting
hierarchical_section_title: Portuguese Renaissance / Arts / Painting
caption_attribution_description: Español: Retrato del rey Juan III de Portugal (1502-1557). El monarca aparece casi de cuerpo entero, mirando al observador, y vestido completamente de negro y con una arma blanca, al tiempo que apoya su mano derecha en un mueble. Y el rostro blanco del monarca contrasta con sus ropajes negros y con el fondo oscuro del lienzo. English: Portrait of king John III of Portugal (1502-1557).
context_page_description: The Portuguese Renaissance refers to the cultural and artistic movement in Portugal during the 15th and 16th centuries. Though the movement coincided with the Spanish and Italian Renaissances, the Portuguese Renaissance was largely separate from other European Renaissances and instead was incredibly important in opening Europe to the unknown and bringing a more worldly view to those European Renaissances, as at the time the Portuguese Empire spanned the globe.
  As the pioneer of the Age of Discoveries, Portugal flourished in the 15th, 16th, and 17th centuries, with voyages to India, the Orient, the Americas, and Africa. This immense trade network would create an incredibly wealthy Portuguese nobility and monarchy, that would become patrons for an incredible flourishing of culture, arts, and technology in Portugal and all over the world.
context_section_description: Painting was one of the more distinguishing factors of the Portuguese Renaissance, being one of the more contrasting arts to the other Renaissances of Europe. Painting in the Portuguese Renaissance was largely sober and almost exclusively religious, being more inline with the Northern Renaissance in nature, not following the pomp and excess of the Italian and Spanish Renaissances.
  Portuguese Renaissance painting was largely in contact with Flemish style.  Links between the two movements reached a new level, in 1430, with the marriage of Isabel of Aviz, Infanta of Portugal, to Philip III, Duke of Burgundy. While the marriage was in negotiations, the Burgundian court sent the famed Jan van Eyck to paint the Portrait of Isabel of Aviz. Van Eyck remained in Portugal for over a year, where he established a school of art, alongside Olivier de Gand and Jean d'Ypres.  This school gave origin to the School of Masters of the Sé Cathedral of Angra do Heroísmo, which was fostered by Jácome de Bruges.
  Nuno Gonçalves, author of the Saint Vincent Panels and designer of the Pastrana Tapestries, is considered one of the precursors of Portuguese Renaissance painting. In his panels, considered one of the most important pieces of painted art in Portuguese history, he depicts prominent figures of Portuguese nobility, royalty, and clergy of the time with a dry style but powerfully realistic. His concern of portraying each figure individually, shows heavy Flemish influence, and foreshadows later Renaissance concerns.
  At the beginning of the 16th century, various schools of painters were active throughout Portugal and its empire, often in collaboration with foreigners. A common trend amongst these schools was to give credit to their works of art as a school, and leave the actual author anonymous, making it difficult to attribute authorship. Even amongst those painters that gave their name to their works, it is complicated to verify the total validity of authorship due to the habit of collective works. A famous example of this was by court painter Jorge Afonso, whose pieces were often worked on by his colleagues at court, such as Frei Carlos, Francisco Henriques, Cristóvão de Figueiredo, Garcia Fernandes, Gregório Lopes, and Jorge Leal, amongst others. In Northern Portugal, a similar group existed, centered on Vasco Fernandes, alongside Gaspar Vaz and Fernão de Anes.
  During the Portuguese Renaissance, the largest center of learning and arts was Lisbon, which thrived as a great city of Europe, because of its privileged position as a major trading center, open to a constant flow of new information, cultures, and finance. Lisbon was a true center of the European Renaissance, where artists and scholars from the corners of Europe came to try to make money. The rich Lisbon nobility funded countless paintings, often for either religious institutions in Lisbon or in their feudal estates. The Portuguese royal court often transferred between Lisbon, Coimbra, a former capital of Portugal, and Évora, which allowed these three cities to establish themselves as the largest centers of the Portuguese Renaissance. In Coimbra, the School of Coimbra was founded by Vicente Gil and his son, Manuel Vicente. In Évora, Manuel I of Portugal established a rich court, which would see its height under his son, Cardinal Infante Henrique of Aviz, Archbishop of Évora, who founded the University of Évora and its school of arts.
caption: John III's reign, which saw Portuguese monopoly on the spice trade, allowed a flourishing of Portuguese painting.
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