ABSTRACT
This chapter describes how letterpress as a communication medium has been used to convey “Portugality”, a concept that combines both modernist (the use of simple and geometric shapes, and plain colours) and traditional (rural and popular motifs) principles. Focusing on the work of Orlando Erasto Portela, and on his personal and professional life, this chapter begins by analysing his influences and describing his creative process; it will further contextualise his work under the Estado Novo and will then undertake an in-detail analysis of a wide sample of labels and packages for consumer products, based on the major cultural, historical, and social themes chosen to illustrate them and also on the technical constraints of letterpress printing methods.
