Oficinas regionais, influências de muitas e desvairadas partes: o caso dos suportes de madeira das pinturas maneiristas de Belchior de Matos da ermida de Geraldes (Peniche, Portugal)

Abstract

The present paper focuses on the study of two paintings, representing Saint Lucy and the Martyrdom of Saint Sebastian, made by Belchior de Matos (c. 1570-1628), for a small church in Peniche, in the early 17th century. The first observations made inthe context of a conservation-restoration intervention showed that the wooden supports had an excellent quality and construction influences that contrast with what would be expected in a small commission to a modest and underpaid provincial artist. Thus, a detailed study of these supports, including the frame and the ground layer, was made using analytical techniques (observation with binocular loupe, photography, dendrochronology, optical microscopy and FTIR) in order to develop further the practices of small provincial painting workshops of the Mannerist period. In fact, contrary to what might be expected, the panels show that these workshops did not necessarily work in isolation but that they possessed a diversified technical knowledge that, besides original solutions, included practices from different geographical origins, from northern to southern Europe. With more case studies, it is important to clarify the extent to which they were or were not consolidated in Portugal.