Júlio dos Reis Pereira

Júlio dos Reis Pereira (Vila do Conde, 1902 – Vila do Conde, 1983), with the pseudonym Julio in the field of visual arts, and Saúl Dias in the literary world, graduated in Civil Engineering at the Science Faculty of the Oporto University, while simultaneously attending the Oporto Superior School of Fine Arts (ESBAP) for two years. In 1930, he showed his work for the first time at the Independent Salon and, four years later, he had his first solo exhibition at Sociedade Nacional de Belas Artes. He had regular solo shows, namely, at UP Gallery (1938), Buchholz Gallery (1944), Pórtico Gallery (1955), Diário de Notícias Gallery (1959 and 1964), among others. A painter of the second generation of modernism in Portugal, although he attended ESBAP, he demonstrated a clearly anti-academy stance, preferring total freedom which, in his work, is revealed together with poetic expression. From 1935, exclusively dedicated to drawing, he started a period when he produced long series, marked, in general, by the absence of colour and by the simplicity of the stroke. He returned to painting in 1972 and to the aesthetics of his first years, mingling a caricature gaze with an oneiric dimension, that is reflected in the urban society characters he portrayed. Between 1927 and 1940 he collaborated with Presença magazine. He also did illustrations for the works of his brother José Maria dos Reis Pereira (with the pseudonym José Régio), namely the cover of his first book. As a writer, he is the author of six published books, and Obra Poética (1967) would receive the Critics Prize in 1980. He participated at the II São Paulo Biennial, in 1953, at EXPO AICA SNBA, in 1972, and he was awarded the first drawing prize at the IV Salão de Outono do Estoril. In 2016, in Vila do Conde, the Julio Gallery and the Julio/Saúl Dias Study Centre were inaugurated, with his large collection of Redondo ceramics and part of his work, which is also present in other national collections.

 

FMV, October 2020