Aurélia de Souza

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Aurélia de Sousa

Maria Aurélia Martins de Sousa (1866–1922) was a Portuguese painter born in Valparaíso, Chile. Her family moved to Porto, Portugal, in 1869 when she was a child. Her father bought a home there, but he died in 1874, when Aurélia was eight. She had a sister, Sofia Martins de Sousa, who was also a painter.

At sixteen, Aurélia began art lessons and painted her first self-portrait. In 1893 she studied at the Fine-Arts Academy of Porto under João Marques de Oliveira. In 1898 she moved to Paris to study at the Académie Julian, with teachers including Jean-Paul Laurens and Jean-Joseph Benjamin-Constant. After her first exhibition, she traveled around Europe for three years before returning to Portugal in 1901. She worked as an illustrator and was active in Porto’s art scene, showing her work at local galleries and in Lisbon.

Aurélia de Sousa died in Porto on May 26, 1922, at the age of 55. Her painting style was personal and naturalist, with influences from realism, Impressionism, and Post-Impressionism. She painted portraits, landscapes, and scenes of everyday life. Her most famous work is Self-Portrait from 1900.