Jaime Silva

Jaime Silva was born in Peso da Régua in 1947. He graduated in Painting from the Escola Superior de Belas-Artes do Porto in 1973, and held a Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian grant in Paris in 1977 and 1978. During this stay, he presented a solo exhibition at the Foundation's Centro Cultural Português in the French capital.

In 1975, he was one of the founders of Grupo Puzzle, which brought artists together around experiments in collective creation in the period following the 25th of April. With this group, he took part in exhibitions and international gatherings, among them the Salon de la Jeune Peinture in Paris in 1976. That same year, he held his first solo exhibition at the Museu Alberto Sampaio in Guimarães.

His work unfolds between painting and drawing. The critically minded figuration of the 1970s gave way to a language of greater gestural intensity, in which colour and references to nature took on a leading role. The body, imagined spaces and symbols run through this career, which maintains a relationship with the visible world even in those compositions closest to abstraction. In the "Cadernos de Sombras", drawing becomes a field of free experimentation, nourished by dream, memory and observation.

Alongside his artistic practice, he has pursued a long career in teaching. He was a Painting teacher at Ar.Co between 1983 and 1987 and, from 1987, took on responsibility for the Painting Course of the Sociedade Nacional de Belas-Artes, which he continues to coordinate and teach. He was artistic director of the Galeria Municipal do Montijo between 1999 and 2011 and has curated numerous exhibitions, including projects presented at the SNBA and at the Cerveira Biennial.

He has represented Portugal in international drawing and painting shows, such as the 2nd Nuremberg Drawing Triennial and the 5th Triennale India in New Delhi, both in 1982. In 2013, the SNBA presented the anthological exhibition "Pintura/Desenho 1966-2011", a selection from which was shown at the Museu da Faculdade de Belas-Artes do Porto in 2014. Between 2018 and 2019, the exhibition "Viacrucis: A Pintura como Interrogação", organised by the Fundação Bienal de Arte de Cerveira, travelled to Vila Nova de Cerveira, Espinho, Amarante and Lisbon.

The distinctions he has received include the Drawing Prize of the 2nd Caldas da Rainha Biennial of Sculpture and Drawing, in 1987, and the Medal of Municipal Merit of Peso da Régua. His work is part of collections such as those of the Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, the Fundação de Serralves, the Fundação Bienal de Arte de Cerveira, the Caixa Geral de Depósitos, the Fundação Millennium bcp and the Centro Internacional das Artes José de Guimarães.