Marques Júnior (Rio de Janeiro RJ 1887 - idem 1960)
Painter and teacher.
Augusto José Marques Júnior studied at the Escola Nacional de Belas Artes (Enba) [National School of Fine Arts] from 1905, as a student of Baptista da Costa (1865 - 1926), Eliseu Visconti (1866 - 1944), Zeferino da Costa (1840 - 1915) and Bérard (1846 - 1910). He received the Foreign Travel Prize in 1916 with the canvas Harmonia em Verde [Harmony in Green], traveling to Paris in 1917, where he remained until mid-1922. At the Académie Julian he attended the studio of Jean-Paul Laurens (1838 - 1921) and, at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière, that of Adolphe Déchenaud (1868 - 1929), where he studied the impressionists, especially Pierre-Auguste Renoir (1841 - 1919). He lost almost all his works in a fire in his studio in 1921. Back in Brazil in 1922, he was appointed painting teacher at Enba. He held the chairs of figure drawing (1934 to 1937) and painting (1938 to 1948). In 1948 he became associate professor of the 2nd chair of artistic drawing and, in 1950, full professor of life drawing. In 1952, he was chosen deputy director of Enba. He held his first solo exhibition in 1922 at Galeria Jorge in Rio de Janeiro. He exhibited in São Paulo in 1923 with Hélios Seelinger (1878 - 1965) and, in 1935, with Henrique Cavalleiro (1892 - 1975). He was president of the Sociedade Brasileira de Belas Artes [Brazilian Society of Fine Arts] and a permanent member of the Serviço do Patrimônio Histórico e Artístico Nacional (Sphan) [National Historic and Artistic Heritage Service]. He was responsible for the decoration of the restaurant of the former Chamber of Deputies in Rio de Janeiro and for the illustrations of the book O Rio de Janeiro no Tempo dos Vice-Reis [Rio de Janeiro in the Time of the Viceroys], by Luiz Edmundo, published in 1951.
Critical Commentary
The literature on painting in Brazil asserts the little influence that impressionism and divisionism had on Brazilian artists. Apart from Eliseu Visconti (1866 - 1944), few Brazilian artists took an interest in and deepened their contact with these late-19th-century artistic currents. It seems that only in the generations that continued their artistic training in Europe in the 1920s (through grants and foreign travel prizes) did an interest in impressionist production awaken, at a time when it was being assimilated by mainstream taste and the international art market. Marques Júnior is an example of an artist who turned his gaze to this production. He studied above all Pierre-Auguste Renoir (1841 - 1919), from whom he assimilated strategies such as plein-air painting and the representation of atmospheric light and relative color (the opposite of local color). These resources would take a long time to be appreciated by the Brazilian public, which made its puzzlement known before blue hair and green cheekbones, like those we see in his Autorretrato [Self-Portrait], now in the Pinacoteca do Estado de São Paulo (Pesp) [São Paulo State Pinacotheca]. In this work, the classic pose of the artist portraying himself is composed with short, vibrant brushstrokes which, especially in the rendering of the skin, achieve that variety of tones characteristic of an attentive perception of how light falls on surfaces. Although modest in scope, Marques Júnior's work is an example that deserves further study for an understanding of the Brazilian art scene in the first half of the 20th century, with its mismatches and aborted paths.
Collections
Acervo Banco Itaú [Banco Itaú Collection] - São Paulo SP
Museu Nacional de Belas Artes (MNBA) [National Museum of Fine Arts] - Rio de Janeiro RJ
Pinacoteca do Estado de São Paulo (Pesp) [São Paulo State Pinacotheca] - São Paulo SP
Sociedade Brasileira de Belas Artes [Brazilian Society of Fine Arts] - Rio de Janeiro RJ
Critiques
"In Marques Júnior there is a love of gentle motifs, as there is a marked inclination toward tones that speak softly to the sensibility and to the caressing harmony of intimate things. The inspired talent of this amiable artist seeks preferably to capture the moment, in 'pochades', in 'patches', in lovely studies of nudes that reproduce the impression felt at the instant the artist sensed it".
Angyone Costa
REFLEXOS do impressionismo no Museu Nacional de Belas Artes. Apresentação de Marinho de Azevedo e Maria Elisa Carrazzoni. Rio de Janeiro: MNBA, 1974.
Solo Exhibitions
1923 - São Paulo SP - First solo exhibition
Group Exhibitions
1913 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 20ª Exposição Geral de Belas Artes [20th General Exhibition of Fine Arts], at Enba - 1st degree honorable mention
1915 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 22ª Exposição Geral de Belas Artes [22nd General Exhibition of Fine Arts], at Enba - bronze medal
1916 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 23ª Exposição Geral de Belas Artes [23rd General Exhibition of Fine Arts], at Enba - foreign travel prize
1920 - Paris (France) - Salon des Artistes Français
1921 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 28ª Exposição Geral de Belas Artes [28th General Exhibition of Fine Arts], at Enba - silver medal
1922 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 29ª Exposição Geral de Belas Artes [29th General Exhibition of Fine Arts], at Enba
1924 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 31ª Exposição Geral de Belas Artes [31st General Exhibition of Fine Arts], at Enba
1925 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 32ª Exposição Geral de Belas Artes [32nd General Exhibition of Fine Arts], at Enba
1926 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 33ª Exposição Geral de Belas Artes [33rd General Exhibition of Fine Arts], at Enba - gold medal
1927 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 34ª Exposição Geral de Belas Artes [34th General Exhibition of Fine Arts], at Enba
1928 - São Paulo SP - Grupo Almeida Júnior [Almeida Júnior Group], at Palácio das Arcadas
1928 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 35ª Exposição Geral de Belas Artes [35th General Exhibition of Fine Arts], at Enba
1929 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 36ª Exposição Geral de Belas Artes [36th General Exhibition of Fine Arts], at Enba
1930 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 37ª Exposição Geral de Belas Artes [37th General Exhibition of Fine Arts], at Enba
1933 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 40ª Exposição Geral de Belas Artes [40th General Exhibition of Fine Arts], at Enba
Posthumous Exhibitions
1970 - São Paulo SP - Pinacoteca do Estado 1970 [State Pinacotheca 1970], at Pinacoteca do Estado
1976 - São Paulo SP - O Retrato na Coleção da Pinacoteca [The Portrait in the Pinacoteca Collection], at Pinacoteca do Estado
1980 - São Paulo SP - A Paisagem Brasileira: 1650 - 1976 [The Brazilian Landscape: 1650 - 1976], at Paço das Artes
1983 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Autorretratos Brasileiros [Brazilian Self-Portraits], at Galeria de Arte Banerj
1986 - São Paulo SP - Dezenovevinte: uma virada no século [Dezenovevinte: A Turn of the Century], at Pinacoteca do Estado
1989 - Fortaleza CE - Arte Brasileira dos Séculos XIX e XX nas Coleções Cearenses: pinturas e desenhos [19th- and 20th-Century Brazilian Art in Ceará Collections: Paintings and Drawings], at Espaço Cultural da Unifor
1999 - São Paulo SP - Sobre Papel, Grafite e Nanquim [On Paper, Graphite and India Ink], at Banco Cidade
2002 - Niterói RJ - Arte Brasileira sobre Papel: séculos XIX e XX [Brazilian Art on Paper: 19th and 20th Centuries], at Solar do Jambeiro
Source: Itaú Cultural
