Profile

He is an Emeritus Full Professor at the Faculty of Arts and Humanities of the University of Lisbon and a researcher at ARTIS-IHA-FLUL.

He worked as a cultural services officer at Sintra City Council (1979-1989) and was a professor at the University of Coimbra (1990-1994) and the University of Lisbon (1995 until retirement).

He is the author of an extensive bibliography on Portuguese Art, Art Theory, and Heritage Studies, namely: O Maneirismo e o Estatuto Social dos Pintores Portugueses (IN/CM, 1983); Estudos de Pintura Maneirista e Barroca (Caminho, 1989); Sintra (Presença, 1989); Santarém (Presença, 1990); Josefa de Óbidos e o Tempo Barroco (IPPC, 1991); A Pintura Maneirista em Portugal. Arte no Tempo de Camões (CNCDP, 1995); A Cripto-História de Arte. Análise de Obras de Arte Inexistentes (Horizonte, 2001); O Renascimento e o Maneirismo (Presença, 2002); O Barroco (Presença, 2003); A Trans-Memória das Imagens. Estudos Iconológicos de Pintura Portuguesa (Cosmos, 2005); O Fresco Maneirista do Paço de Vila Viçosa, Parnaso dos Duques de Bragança (FCB, 2008); Arte, Religião e Imagens em Évora no Tempo do Arcebispo D. Teotónio de Bragança (FCB, 2015); Os Retratos dos Meses da Sé de Miranda do Douro (DRCN, 2019); Camões: Altos Cumes, Scabelicastro e Correlatos (Cosmos, 2024, co-authored with Mário Rui Silvestre); He is a member of the editorial boards of the journals Monumentos, ARTIS, ARTisON, Quintana, and BSAA.

He is a Full Member of the Lisbon Academy of Sciences, the Portuguese Academy of History, the Naval Academy, and the Academy of Fine Arts. In 2023, he was awarded the Medal of Cultural Merit by the Portuguese Ministry of Culture.