About the work
Made in 1962, Country Woman with Festive Banner belongs to ESPIGA Pinto’s early Alentejo period, shortly after his return from Lisbon, where he had studied at the Lisbon School of Fine Arts. Back in the Alentejo, he encountered the region not only through childhood memory, but through renewed adult attention: its rural labour, clothing, popular rituals, harvest feasts and religious-pagan village celebrations.
The female figure is central to this work. ESPIGA often associated women with the forms, presences and continuities of his early life, from the family household to the peasant women who passed through the streets of Vila Viçosa. Here, the country woman carries a festive banner, linking the figure to the processional and ceremonial world of the Alentejo village. The image suggests a moment where daily life and ritual meet.
ESPIGA’s interest in these festivities was not incidental. His research into Alentejo popular traditions is recorded in his photographic archive, and related imagery also appeared on the cover of Alentejo, the record by Michel Giacometti, the noted ethnographic researcher. Within the wider oeuvre, this linocut is therefore an important early example of how ESPIGA transformed lived observation and regional culture into a concise symbolic language.
Details
Artist: ESPIGA Pinto
Title: Country Woman with Festive Banner (Camponesa com pendão festivo)
Date: 1962
Medium: Linocut on paper
Dimensions: 43.7 x 33 cm
Edition: Ed. Espiga, trial proof
Signed and dated by the artist.
Condition
The work presents in excellent overall condition, with no significant condition issues noted at the time of inspection.
________________________
FRAME NOT INCLUDED. This artwork is sold unframed. Bespoke framing options and framing advice are available. Please contact us. Any frame, mount or room setting shown in images is for illustrative purposes only. Please check the stated artwork dimensions before ordering.
