Portuguese painter and ceramist born in Beira Baixa in 1927, Manuel Cargaleiro, presents his paintings for the first time, in 1953, at the Galeria de Março in Lisbon.

This oil from 1965, with its title referring to the poem by Álvaro de Campos, explores a pictorial vocabulary closer to - pop art
and - nouveau réalisme
, which were also emerging in the 1960s. Works such as - Passam Flores Imaginárias
, 1968, - Les Amoureux
, 1969, - Les Fleures Imaginaires
, 1974, or - Les Fleurs Jaunes
, 1986, reveal a structuring, through large patches of colour, similar to - Ode Marítima
.

Using voluminous patches of plain colour, Cargaleiro structures the work in layers: a dark background to which he superimposes a red ovoid shape, over which he cuts a semi-circular shape in another shade of red and various circular shapes, from the blues, the white, to the black centre. The focus of the composition turns out to be the circular, non-regular form, composed of four concentric layers of colour, either by the tonal contrast of its cool tones with the warmer, darker tones, or by the framing that the adjacent forms provide. With a great economy of means, Cargaleiro seems to create an abstract stela, of a jocular joy, for that - topos
of Portuguese culture that is the - Ode Marítima
.

LC