Luís Vieira-Baptista
(PLASTIC ARTIST)

LUÍS VIEIRA-BAPTISTA was born in Lisbon, in 1954. 
For military reasons, he graduated in Piloting in the Merchant Navy Nautical Officer course. He attended the Life Model Drawing course at SN Belas Artes in Lisbon. 
He exhibited his work individually for the first time in 1975, at the Casino Estoril Art Gallery. 
In the eighties he moved to Switzerland, where he truly began an international artistic career.
He returned to Portugal in 1990, carrying the aesthetic concept he created, ‘Visionism’, and formed two artistic groups: 

The “Visionista”, where the aforementioned aesthetic was presented in a Manifesto (Convento do Beato, Lisbon 1991), and the “Artitude”, aimed at intervening in public and heritage spaces with high-impact installations: “Castelo de Leiria” (The Blue Planet), “Mãe d´Água das Amoreiras”, Lisbon, (Nymphs of the Tagus and other goddesses) and “A Divina Tragédia”, Museu de História Natural, in Lisbon, among others (1994/95). 
In 2000, the book/album “Visionismo ou as Sincronias do Acaso” was launched at the International Contemporary Art Fair by Hugin Editores, and in 2021, Sociedade Estoril Sol published another book/album entitled “Sonhar Portugal”, referring to the visionist paintings of the Century. XXI. 
In 2003 he was awarded the Medal of Cultural Merit, Gold level, by the C.M. from Oeiras after building the sculptural monument “At the sea gate: Visionist Ship”. 
Since 2017, the Main Hall of the Marquis of Pombal Foundation, Aciprestes Palace, Linda-a-Velha, has been named after him: Luís Vieira-Baptista Main Hall.
He has held more than 50 solo exhibitions and dozens of collective and group shows. 
His most recent solo exhibition took place at the Convento de Cristo, in Tomar, (“Telesma and the Knights of the Sea”, 2023), and from February 17, 2024 he will participate in the collective exhibition of the David Melgueiro Association www.davidmelgueiro.org, of which he is the president, at the Loulé salt mine with the environmental theme “Oceans – Sea is life”.
The Municipal Councils of Lisbon, Oeiras, Cascais, Amadora, Sintra and Óbidos have his works, both in painting (Sea Museum in Cascais, Water Museum, Lisbon, José Saramago Library, Óbidos) and in public sculpture (Lisbon, Oeiras and Cascais), as well as some official bodies (ISEG, Lisbon; Escola Superior Náutica Inf. D. Henrique, Paço de Arcos; Polytechnic Institute, Leiria) and private bodies, Portuguese and foreign, among which the collection of Prince Albert II of Monaco stands out.

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