On the occasion of the artist's 95th birthday and the year of Franco-Portuguese friendship, the Helene Bailly Gallery is proud to present the prolific work of Manuel Cargaleiro, a major artist of the École de Paris.
Manuel Cargaleiro was born on 16 March 1927 in Vila Velha de Ródão, Portugal. In 1935, he began modelling clay in the pottery workshop of José Trindade, in Monte da Caparica. Wishing to embark on an artistic career, he studied in Lisbon where he attended the School of Fine Arts.
In 1949, he exhibited his ceramics for the first time at the Palácio Foz in Lisbon, where his first individual exhibition was also held in 1952.
In 1957, the artist moved to Paris. France became his second home. He became friends with the artists Nathalie Goncharova, Michel Larionov and Camille Bryen. The artists of the School of Paris such as Delaunay, Ernst, Vasarely and Klee had an influence on his work, pushing him towards the avant-garde. His compositions are based on geometric modules and a range of primary colours very rich in nuances, suggesting movement in space.
Over the following decades, his work was shown in countless individual and group exhibitions in France, Brazil, Japan, Germany, Italy, Angola, Mozambique, Spain, Venezuela, Switzerland and Belgium.
On 31 January 1990, he created the Manuel Cargaleiro Foundation in Lisbon, and in 2004 the Museo Artistico Industriale di Ceramica Manuel Cargaleiro was inaugurated (moved to Ravello in 2015, under the name Fondazione Museo Manuel Cargaleiro).
On 17 June 2016, Cargaleiro joined architect Álvaro Siza Vieira for A Essência da Forma, the inaugural exhibition of the Oficina de Artes Manuel Cargaleiro in Seixal.
In 2018, Cargaleiro is working on a tile panel for the extension of the Champs-Élysées-Clemenceau station of the Paris metro (for which he was already publicly commissioned in 1995) giving access to the Grand Palais.
In 2019, he was awarded the Medal of Cultural Merit by the Portuguese Prime Minister António Costa and the Minister of Culture Graça Fonseca, as well as the Grand Vermeil Medal by the Mayor of Paris Anne Hidalgo. In the same year, he was also awarded the Turismo Centro de Portugal Prize, recognising a personality who has greatly contributed to the development and popularity of tourism in the Central Portugal region.
