Portugal-+Brenna+McGinn

Portugal

Overview of Portugal: Portugal is located in southwestern Europe and is the western most country on the continent. Portugal is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean on one side and Spain on the other. It dates back very far to 868 but the official date of independence is July 25th, 1139. It is a democratic republic which was ruled by their constitution of 1976. Portugal is part of the United Nations, NATO, OECD and many more. The country has one main religion, Catholic, and one main language, Portuguese. Beginning the 1900's, Portugal had a very high illiterate rate. In 1930, 63.1% of the population of Portugal was illiterate. By the 1960's public education was made available to those between the ages of six and 12. In the 1970's there were many new universities within the country. Only 67% of the working population completed basic education in Portugal, which is around 3.7 million. Just recently within the past five years, the ministry of education has been enforcing arts education in the public education systems. Arts education was just recently recognized and being enforced. Over the past 50 years the country has been working on their public school system.

Education System: The education system in Portugal is controlled by two ministries-- the ministry of education, which is concerned with pre-higher education, and the ministry of science, which is concerned with higher education. Pre-higher education is divided into basic education and secondary education. The basic education is divided into three cycles. Children start basic education in cycle one, which is four years, at age six. Children have the option to go to a public school, which is free of charge, or a private school, which is not free but one can be reimbursed partially or fully if the public schools are full. In each cycle, arts education is incorporated however there is more specific arts such as dance, music, etc. the higher the cycle is. After the nine years in basic education, students go on to secondary education.

Jose de Almada Negriros: Jose was born April 3rd, 1893 in Sao Tome, Portugal and died June 15, 1970 in Lisbon, Portugal. He held his first solo exhibition in 1913 at the age of 20 which featured approximately 90 drawings. In 1915, Jose published work of poems and text in the artistic magazine called Orpheu. This magazine introduced modern literature to Portugal. In the years to follow, Jose produced pieces of work in various categories such as novels, glass work, illustrations, murals, printmaking and many more. He was influenced by cubism and futurism styles of art and became a very well known modern artist in Portugal. He married another painter in 1934 named Sarah Afonso and had one son, José Afonso de Almada Negreiros. Jose did art in many forms throughout his life. He thought of himself as futuristic artist. His paintings were mostly of people in everyday life scenes with geometric shapes and arabesque richness while his work with visual arts stuck to mostly tapestry and choreographing ballet and plays.


 * Art work by Jose:**

Portrait of Fernando Pessoa, oil on canvas

Glass window art

Teacher Education: To be a teacher of basic education, you have to take part in a four-year program at a university to get your //Licenciado// degree. A new law passed in 2007 states that a teacher also has to "mestre" degree in Basic and Secondary Education. There is a project called "Public Art and Art Education" in Portugal that combines arts and education by professionals.

"Public Art and Art Education" Project: This is a project comprised of teachers, artists, researchers, educators and cultural agents who are interested in issues of public art as an educational resource in both formal and informal educational contexts, in Portugal and Greece. The Objectives of the project are to promote intercultural and collaborative work, share knowledge and practice and promote the use of works of public art in education as educational relevant practices in Portugal and Greece. The project encourages direct contact between artists / creators and students at all levels. This project is the only sort of organization that I could find involving the arts and education. There weren't any specific events or things they have done to reach out to students in the countries, the projects website didn't have a lot of information about its history either.

Conclusion: When researching Portugal's art education and education in general there were a few things I found to be interesting. The history of Portugal dates back very far, it is one of the oldest countries in Europe. However, it wasn't until 1960 that they made public education available to all. The government passed laws in the mid-60's however failed to implement them. The Revolution of 1974 created chaos in the school systems and resulted in students challenged teachers and everyone challenged administrators. The 1976 constitution is what controls the schools, eliminating illiteracy which was a huge problem, providing accommodations for students of special needs, and many others. I found it interesting that a country that dates back so far has a fairly new education system which seems to still be developing. I think the newly developing education system has a lot to do with why I could only find limited information. I read official documents stating the topics that were covered in each cycle however it seemed that no one was checking up to see if the schools were actually following these. I had a very different experience with arts education. Ever since I remember I had art and music classes in every grade up until 9th then in high school it wasn't required. There has always been arts integrated into my education and it seems like in Portugal there is supposed to be, but it isn't taken seriously.

Works Cited: http://www.culturalpolicies.net/web/portugal.php?aid=831 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portugal#Education http://countrystudies.us/portugal/61.htm http://www.vidaslusofonas.pt/almada_negreiros.htm http://www.arqnet.pt/portal/biografias/almada_negreiros.html https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/po.html http://publicartinschool.ning.com/