Sarah Affonso, wife (of) artist

Abstract

Re-examining memoirs of Sarah Affonso, which mainly speak of her life as wife of Almada Negreiros, this article reflects on the typical sexual division (including aesthetically) of work between a married couple of artists. Where domesticity, «feminine» painting and even career abandonment fall to the woman, in favour of the talent and success of the husband. The question of marriage (injustice requires, however, a more complex examination, observant of the specific ways and rationalisations which compete to compensate for the imbalance. Although there is no equality in the Sarah-Almada couple, there is something like a consensus of equity. This is based as much on the assumption of the legitimacy of individual differences - which is justified in an artistic ethic - as on Sarah's self-positioning in relation to the marital bond. It is this self-positioning, the voluntarist decision to live her life thus, which interests us here.