I spent the summer of 2005 lecturing and researching in Portugal.  I was invited by the director of the graduate program in Portuguese Culture at the Universidade de Trás-os-Montes e Alto Douro (UTAD) to share with their students my research on Brazilian art and culture. I also conducted research on the contemporary Portuguese sculptors of religious images and investigated the religious ritual of the Office of Tenebrae that traditionally took place three days before Easter.

A grant from the NMSU College of Arts and Sciences allowed me to expand on my previous research conducted in Brazil from 2002 to 2003 on the contemporary sculptors of religious images in Minas Gerais.  While in Portugal, I was also able to study a number of very important structures located in the central and northern regions of Portugal.  Medieval, renaissance and baroque churches and monasteries were digitally documented to be used as teaching tools.

The photo galleries included on this page are organized by region and types of structures such as Costa da Prata, Lisbon, Monasteries, Historical Cities and Northern region. On the litoral Costa da Prata, I studied structures in the cities of São João das Lampas, Azeiro do Norte, Ericeira, São Julião, Nazaré and Peniche.  The base of my research was in the city of Lisbon where I focused on a number of churches, palaces and visited their most significant collections in art museums. The exquisite monastic complexes analyzed and documented included those of Alcobaça, Batalha, Hieronymous, Mafra and Tomar.  I also studied the structures in the historical cities of Évora, Palmela, Setúbal, Sintra, Óbidos and Leiria.  In the Northern region of Portugal, emphasis was given to the cities of Vila Real and Régua which gave continuity to the research conducted in 1993 in the cities of Porto and Braga.

Last, but not least, I would like to thank my good friend in Portugal, Carlos Mendonca for the very generous support and help he extended to my husband and I while in Lisbon.

The photographs on this site are provided for educational purposes only, and may not be copied, reproduced, redistributed, manipulated, projected, used or altered in any way without prior express written permission.