Gilberto [de Mello] Freyre (1900−87) worked as a sociologist, anthropologist, historian, writer, and journalist. From the start, he was highly conscious of the great geographic and cultural distances that separated his region from the political and economic centers, Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo. As early as 1926, he proposed for his city, Recife, the Primeiro Congresso Regionalista do Nordeste (see the manifesto in [doc. no. 1074787]). This was an event that defended aspects of the culture and customs of his region (northeastern Brazil), a position that Freyre would defend, tooth and nail, with respect to two important painters. Unfortunately for the writer’s purposes, the two painters, Cícero Dias and Vicente do Rego Monteiro, each had spent long periods of time in France. Regarding Dias, see “O regional e o universal na pintura de Cícero Dias” [doc. no. 1075269]. Regarding Rego Monteiro, to whom the writer paid a visit in Paris, see “Notas a lapis sobre um pintor indiferente” [doc. no. 785071].
The document presented here is a response to an article written by Mário Pedrosa, “Sociólogos versus Pintores,” published in the Jornal do Brasil, in Rio de Janeiro. In this text, Pedrosa defends the painter Candido Portinari believing that he was the victim of an unfair assessment made by Freyre. Freyre challenges the idea that the painters from northeastern Brazil were “conservative;” that is to say, exclusively dedicated to the preservation of regional traditions.
Starting in the 1930s, Pedrosa had paid special attention to Portinari’s paintings. The article, “Impressões de Portinari,” was published in the Diário da Noite (São Paulo, 1934), emphasizing regional, ethnic/socially oriented works such as Café and Índia e mulata. Subsequently, he wrote about the historical mural of the conversion with the first mass in Brazil, in his article, “A missa de Portinari,” that appeared in the Correio da Manhã (August 8, 1948).