'What can a cinematic fury do?' Visual culture and the contradictions of modernity.

The 130th anniversary of José Leitão de Barros’s birth in 2026 (on 22 October) provides the ideal opportunity to revisit one of the leading figures in the arts and, above all, in Portuguese cinema of the first half of the 20th century. This re-examination aims to offer a fresh interpretation of his work and career, in which his cosmopolitan public image is expressed through his roles as a filmmaker, painter and graphic artist, set designer, theatre director, choreographer, playwright, critic, journalist, chronicler, editor of periodicals and, broadly speaking, cultural producer, all set within a social context where his relationship with political power turned him into a propagandist. The International Conference ‘What Can a Cinematic Fury Do? Visual culture and the contradictions of modernity’, which will take place at the National Library of Portugal on 16 and 17 March 2027, aims to pave the way for a renewed understanding of a figure who both embodies and challenges the context of his multiple roles, as a creator who defies categorisation and strays into the margins.
The International Colloquium “What Can a Cinematic ‘Furious One’ Do? Visual Culture and the Contradictions of Modernity’, calls for the submission of proposals for papers on a wide range of multidisciplinary topics, focusing on case studies of varying scales and configurations, capable of deepening our understanding, raising new questions and broadening the debates surrounding the figure and the political, social, creative and artistic legacy of Leitão de Barros, as well as the different contexts in which he operated.

Proposals for papers of approximately 20 minutes in Portuguese, English, or Spanish are welcome and must include the following:
- title of the proposal;
- details of the author(s) (name, affiliated institution, country and email address);
- abstract (up to 300 words);
- short biographical note (up to 250 words).

Submission
Please submit your proposal via the following online submission form: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdGZ5m8xAaCXw8NyvdMaYXnl7qeQQPYtzE4Sow-5-NMpPPlEA/viewform

For further details regarding the conference, please visit: https://jlbcoloquio130.weebly.com/eng.html