Gregório Lopes (''c.'' 1490 – 1550) was one of the most important

Renaissance The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history The history of Europe is traditionally divided into four time periods: prehistoric Europe (prior to about 800 BC), classical antiquity (800 BC to AD ...

painters from

Portugal Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic ( pt, República Portuguesa, links=yes ), is a country whose mainland is located on the Iberian Peninsula of Southwestern Europe, and whose territory also includes the Atlantic archipelagos of ...

. Gregório Lopes was educated in the workshop of Jorge Afonso, the

court painter A court painter was an artist who painted for the members of a royal or princely family, sometimes on a fixed salary and on an exclusive basis where the artist was not supposed to undertake other work. Painters were the most common, but the cour ...

King Manuel I Manuel I (; 31 May 146913 December 1521), known as the Fortunate ( pt, O Venturoso), was King of Portugal from 1495 to 1521. A member of the House of Aviz, Manuel was Duke of Beja and Viseu prior to succeeding his cousin, John II of Portugal, as ...

. Later he himself became court painter for both Manuel I and for his successor, John III. In 1514 he married the daughter of Jorge Afonso, and in 1520 was knighted by Prince Jorge de Lencastre and entered the

Order of Santiago The Order of Santiago (; es, Orden de Santiago ), is a religious and military order founded in the 12th century. It owes its name to the Patron Saint of Spain, "Santiago" (St. James the Greater). Its initial objective was to protect the pilgri ...

. The work of Gregório Lopes mainly consists of painted religious altarpieces for various churches and monasteries in central Portugal. Between 1520 and 1525 he worked (together with ''Jorge Leal'') in painting altarpieces for the Saint Francis Convent of Lisbon. Also in the 1520s he painted panels for the Church of Paraíso (Paradise), also in Lisbon. In his first fase, Gregório Lopes also worked in

Sesimbra Sesimbra () is a municipality of Portugal, in the Setúbal District, lying at the foothills of the ''Serra da Arrábida'', a mountain range between Setúbal and Sesimbra. Due to its particular position at the Setúbal Bay, near the mouth of the S ...

Setúbal Setúbal (, , ; cel-x-proto, Caetobrix) is a city and a municipality in Portugal. The population in 2014 was 118,166, occupying an area of . The city itself had 89,303 inhabitants in 2001. It lies within the Lisbon metropolitan area. In the ti ...

, and in the Monastery of Ferreirim, in this latter case together with

Cristóvão de Figueiredo Cristóvão de Figueiredo (died ) was a Portuguese Renaissance painter. Like many other important painters of the time, Cristóvão de Figueiredo was a pupil of Master Jorge Afonso, in Lisbon, in the early 16th century. He later worked together wi ...

and Garcia Fernandes. The painter moved in the 1530s to the city of

Tomar Tomar (), also known in English as Thomar (the ancient name of Tomar), is a city and a municipality in the Santarém district of Portugal. The town proper has a population of about 20,000. The municipality population in 2011 was 40,677, in an a ...

, where he painted various panels for the Round Church of the Convent of Christ (1536–1539) and the main altarpiece of the Church of Saint John the Baptist (1538–1539). His last known works include altarpieces for the Convent of Santos-o-Novo in Lisbon (1540) and the Valverde Convent, near

Évora Évora ( , ) is a city and a municipality in Portugal. It has 53,591 inhabitants (2021), in an area of 1307.08 km2. It is the historic capital of the Alentejo and serves as the seat of the Évora District. Due to its well-preserved old ...

(1545). Many of Gregório Lopes' works can be seen in the

National Museum of Ancient Art The Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga (; MNAA), also known in English as the National Museum of Ancient Art, is a Portuguese national art museum located in Lisbon. With over 40,000 items spanning a vast collection of painting, sculpture, goldware, fu ...

, in Lisbon. His son, Cristóvão Lopes (1516–1594), was also an artist and worked as a portrait painter for the Portuguese royal family.

References

Portuguese painting in the Age of Humanism (by Joaquim Oliveira Caetano).

Portuguese Renaissance painting (by Maria José Palla).

External links

Portuguese painters Portuguese male painters 1550 deaths Court painters 1490s births 16th-century Portuguese people Portuguese Renaissance painters Catholic painters {{Portugal-painter-stub