Oriental Art in the Collections of the Museum of São Roque

Descriptive catalog and selected inventory of the oriental art collection, a valuable legacy belonging to the collection of the Museum of São Roque of the Santa Casa da Misericórdia de Lisboa. “The collection of the Museum and Church of São Roque (as the professed house of the Jesuits in Portugal) – property of the Santa Casa da Misericórdia since 1768 – brings together an important set of objects from the Near East, India, China, and Japan that reflect this process of acculturation, resulting from the commercial or cultural relations established between Portugal and the Asian continent,” says Teresa Morna, director of the Museum of São Roque. This catalog presents highly exotic pieces that prove the Portuguese presence in those regions and testify to the cultural exchange between Portugal and the East. This publication also includes a set of essays by art history specialists that focus on the themes of the Society of Jesus and decorative arts in Portuguese East, the reliquary chest of Saint Francis Xavier – a masterpiece of 17th-century Goan goldsmithing, the Luso-Oriental imagery – brief characterization, or the itineraries of the Holy Land – material testimonies of the routes between the East and Europe in the collections of the Museum of São Roque. This edition of the catalog of oriental art in the collections of the Museum of São Roque, revised and updated, also includes an illustrated description of a set of 30 pieces, organized according to their provenance - Palestine (Holy Land), India and Ceylon, China and Japan, selected pieces from a total of 63 inventoried objects.

Author: João Miguel Simões; Maria do Carmo Lino; Maria João Ferreira; Nuno Vassallo e Silva; Pedro Dias; Teresa Freitas Morna

Year of publication: 2010
Publisher: SCML, Museum of São Roque
ISBN: 9789728761714 (PT), 9789722718903 (ENG)