Eça de Queirós by Columbano

Eça de Queirós (1845- 1900) is arguably Portugal's best novelist and one of my favourite writers. Columbano Bordalo Pinheiro (1857 - 1929) is one of the key painters of late 19th Century, early 20th Century and again, a personal favourite. He his known among other things for a series of paintings of Portuguese intelectuals and key figures of the last quarter of the 19th Century. One of the most celebrated at the time was his portrait of Eça de Queirós. Sadly, a few months before the writer's death the painting was lost, with a few others, in a shipwreck while returning from an exhibition in Paris. And obviously, the sitter's death prevented a new one being made.

Fortunately, as I found out recently, there is a surviving photo (below, taken from here). It makes me even more sorry that I can't see it, but at least I can see what the painting looked like. And I love what he did with the hands.