Maria Helena VIEIRA DA SILVA (1908-1992)

Maria Helena Vieira da Silva was born in Lisbon in 1908, and passed away in Paris in 199 2. She was a single child, who revealed a keen interest for music and reading at an early age, and later discovered her true passion: painting and drawing. From a very early stage, she received lessons, and due to her motivation for sculpture, she studied Anatomy at the Faculdade de Medicina in Lisbon (Lisbon Medical School).

At the age of 18, she moved to Paris with her family’s support, and there she enrolled in the Academies of La Grande Chaumière and Scandinave. She later abandoned sculpture and dedicated herself to painting and engraving, where she worked with Duffrene, Waroquier and had lessons with Fernand Léger.

In 1930, she married the Hungarian painter Arpad Szenes, who encouraged her and protected her throughout her life. The following year she exhibited in the Salons d’Automne and Surindépendants.

During this period, works such as Les Balançoises and Le Quai de Marseille emerged, revealing the authenticity of her artistic qualities.

In 1932, she attended classes at the Academie Ranson, as a student of Bissière. For Vieira da Silva this was a long period of discovery and reflection: she discovered the importance of repetition, the different perspectives, the grids, and the squares that were used in her works Atelier-Lisbonne (1934-35) and Composition (1936). Also noticeable from this period are works such as: La Chambre à carreaux (1935), Le Jeu de cartes (1937) and La Machine optique (1937). She realised the apex of her artistic endeavors in 1940, with the acclaimed work, L’Atelier.

During World War Two she returned to Lisbon with Arpad. However, ostracised by Salazar’s policies, they fled to Brazil, where their lives were financially and emotionally more difficult.

Missing Paris made her create the noticeable works Le Métro (1940) and La Partie d’échecs (1943), which are regarded as true masterpieces. Although misunderstood by the wide majority of the Brazilian critics, the poets Cecília Meireles and Murilo Mendes enjoyed her work and promoted it, so that in 1942 the artist exhibited in the Museu Nacional de Belas-Artes and at the Palácio Municipal in Belo Horizonte in 1946.

Back in Paris, in 1947, she initiated an important period with La Bibliothèque and the Gare Saint-Lazare (1947). She did several exhibitions, both in France and abroad, and during that period was considered one of the most prominent figures of the Paris School’s lyric abstractionism.

In works such as La Bataille des Rouges et des Bleus (1935) and Composition 55 (1955), the spaces are organised, and both the labyrinthine perspectives and the minute repetitions are maintained. However, from that point forward, her work became ever more unreal and magical.

In 1956, Vieira and Arpad became French citizens and moved permanently to their house/atelier on l’Abbé Carton Street.

By the end of the 1950s the artist was almost solely dedicated to engravings and to illustrating the book by René Char, L’Indépendance lointaine. In 1961 she obtained the International Painting Prize at the VI Biennial of São Paulo (Brazil). In the 1960s she painted several works such as L’Été (1961), L’Entreprise impossible (1961-67), Au fur et à mesure (1963), Bibliothèque (1966) and Maio de 68 (1968).

In 1970 the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation organised a retrospective of all her works. Following de 25th of April Revolution, she was awarded the “Grã Cruz de Santiago e Espada”, by the President of the Republic.

From the 70s there are widely renown canvases such as: New Amsterdam I and II (1970), Les Trois fenêtres (1972-73), Bibliothèque en feu (1970-74) and Arcanne (1978).

During the 1980s, her work was frequently interrupted by her husband’s illness and then later by his death. Nevertheless in 1986 she re-emerged with Soleils, an unforgettable work, contemporaneous with other important pieces such as, Chemins de paix (1985), Déchirure (1984-85), L’Issue lumineuse (1983-86) and Le Retour d’Orphée (1982-86).

She returned to Portugal often, in order to closely follow the reproduction of Le Métro into tiles at a Lisbon subway station. She also attended the premieres of the exhibitions dedicated to her husband.

In June 1988, her eightieth birthday, the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, in a joint effort with the Centre National d’Arts Plastiques, inaugurated a selected exhibition of her work and the Portuguese government reiterated its homage by awarding her the “Grã Cruz da Ordem da Liberdade”.

MARIA ALMEIDA LIMA