Justino Alves was born in Oporto in 1940 and he passed away at 75 years old, in 2015, also in Oporto. He was teacher and director at the Funchal Fine Arts Academy between 1968 and 1970, and in 1971 he began to teach at the Lisbon Fine Arts School. In 1976, he left for Paris as a grantee of the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, and there he had the opportunity to contact with the vanguard of European painting, realising the potential of art as construction of the individual and of the communities. Throughout his career, he participated in various solo and group exhibitions and did settings for ballet. He received various prizes, among which, the Mestre Joaquim Lopes prize, in 1965, the National Painting prize, in 1969 or the 3rd Almada Negreiros Prize. Some of his solo exhibitions include Museu Abade Baçal, Bragança, 1965, Calouste Gulbenkian Cultural Centre, Paris, 1978, Retrospective of the Exhibition Room of Galicia Foundation, Corunha, Spain, 1991, Conta Corrente, Galeria São Mamede, Lisbon, 2014. Among his group exhibitions, the following stand out: Portuguese Modern Artists, Quadrum Gallery, Lisbon, 1974 or 50 years of Portuguese Art, Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, Lisbon, 2007. The work of Justino Alves is represented in various national public institutions, museums and foundations.
JFB, July 2022
