Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation Garden

Praia dos Caneiros (Caneiros Beach), Algarve, Portugal

The painting captured in this photograph is titled The Wrestlers (Les Lutteurs), painted in 1853 by the French Realist master Gustave Courbet, and currently housed in the Museum of Fine Arts in Budapest. Conceived as a direct companion piece to his famously scandalous work The Bathers (Les Baigneuses), which focused strictly on the female nude, this large-scale canvas shifts the artist's provocative realism toward the male anatomy. Under the socially acceptable pretext of depicting a popular public sport, Courbet introduced a veiled erotic and physical tension by avoiding classical athletic ideals in favor of raw flesh, straining muscles, and intense, highly tactile body contact between the two semi-nude men.

Echoes of the Past: The Santa Bernarda Caravel

Although originally built as a French fishing trawler in 1968, the Santa Bernarda was cleverly retrofitted for tourism to evoke the silhouette of a 15th-century Portuguese caravel. While her double-masted rig and wooden decks nod to the classic nautical traits of vessels from the Age of Discovery, she seamlessly blends these historical elements with modern engineering and contemporary navigation systems.

Rua Norberto de Araújo is one of the most picturesque and historic corners of the Alfama neighborhood in Lisbon. This iconic street, shaped like a staircase, flows directly from Largo das Portas do Sol at the very top down into the labyrinthine slopes of the district, with its houses built directly over the ancient Moorish Wall (Cerca Moura). As you descend or climb these stairs, you can see the very foundations where the Islamic fortifications once stood, serving today as the structural base for the iconic Santa Luzia viewpoint and the traditional homes that flank this cobblestone alley.

Today, this historic alley stands as a poignant boundary where the daily lives of Alfama’s remaining long-time residents intersect with the silent pressures of tourist gentrification, highlighting a delicate contrast between deep-rooted local identity and the ever-shifting presence of passersby along its ancient foundations.

Reflection of the street and of the 18th-century Convent of Nossa Senhora da Assunção on the storefront window of Galeria São Mamede. Rua da Escola Politécnica, Lisbon.