Raúl Perez (Lovelhe, Minho, 1944) is one of the most important Portuguese artists of the second half of the 20th century, indispensable within the context of surrealism, although he always refused any labels, or explicit classification of his work within any artistic genre in particular. In 1972, he had his first solo exhibition at São Mamede Gallery, where he showed images from his Oneiric Diary. This title could be extended to the rest of his work, which, similar to the pages of this diary, is composed of records of the enigmatic universe of his dreams – a mysterious, disturbing world, where, among castles, doors without interior, holes and winged towers, appear fractions of ambiguous figures, that observe us in expectation, as well as other fantastic beings, and also sphinxes that also inhabit this scenic space. He joined the Phases group (Paris) the following year, and from their joint activity stands out the exhibition in Brussels, at the Ixelles Museum (1974), the surrealist international exhibition Marvellous Freedom – Vigillance of Desire (1976), in Chicago, and also the first exhibitions of the group in Portugal, in 1977. He had numerous exhibitions, namely the frequent participation in important surrealism national and international exhibitions: O Cadáver-Esquisito, sua exaltação, commemorating the 50th anniversary of the Paris surrealist movement (1975, Ottolini Gallery), Three Poets of Surrealism: António Maria Lisboa, Pedro Oom and Mário Henrique-Leiria (1981, National Library of Lisbon), The Fantastic of Modern Art (1986, Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation), the exhibition organised the Madrid surrealist magazine, Salamandra (1992, Madrid) and Surrealism or Not (1994, São Mamede Gallery). In the 1975 exhibition as in another, in 2003, he showed side by side with Cruzeiro Seixas, with whom he had a special friendship. As an illustrator, he made the covers of the first Dutch edition of The Anarchist Banker by Fernando Pessoa (1980) and of Julien Gracq’s romance, Le Rivage des Syrtes (1981), among others. In 2006, the Berardo Collection Museum inaugurated the exhibition Raúl Perez – Drawing and Painting, the largest ever organised of his work, which included approximately one hundred drawings and paintings.
FMV, October 2020
