Jorge Martins (Lisbon, 1940) studied painting and architecture at the School of Fine Arts in Lisbon, having also developed the engraving technique from 1958, at the Cooperative Society of Portuguese Engravers. He shared a studio with the painter José Escada until 1960, year of his first solo exhibition at Galeria Gravura, in Lisbon. In 1961 the Portuguese social and political landscape, marked by the beginning of the colonial war in Angola, would justify his departure for Paris where he lived and worked until 1991. In the French capital he coexisted with Júlio Pomar, Arpad Szenes, Manuel Baptista, Vieira da Silva and with the KWY group. He did not depart completely from the Portuguese artistic environment, having received in 1969 honorable mentions at the Mobil and Soquil exhibitions in Lisbon. From Paris he traveled to New York where he established a studio between 1975 and 1976 and was able to develop central research in his work: ways of reproducing light and its manifestations in space. Later he widens the spectrum of possibilities in his painting by exploring the representation of the human figure and color, occasionally incorporating words. His work would constantly be marked by a dichotomy between figuration and abstraction. In the scope of illustration, to which he dedicated himself in parallel with painting, he would receive the Gulbenkian Prize for Illustration of Children's Literature for the Livro das Sete Cores in 1984. In 1985 he was one of the representatives of Portugal at the 18th International Biennial of São Paulo and, the following year, he began to collaborate with Galeria Valentim de Carvalho, dividing his activity between Lisbon and Paris. Demonstrative of the recognition that his work achieved are the AICA Prize, which he received in 1971 and 1988, the Drawing Prize of the III Plastic Arts Exhibition of the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, in 1986, and the CELPA Prize of the Arpad Szenes-Vieira da Silva Foundation of consecration, in 2003. After his definitive return to Portugal in 1991 he was an active figure in the Portuguese artistic nucleus. However, he continued to hold several individual exhibitions abroad, namely in Brussels (1988) and Paris (1989, 1990 and 1991). His work is present in several collections in Portugal and abroad.
FMV, October 2020
