Department of Conservation and Restoration, FCT-UNL REQUIMTE - Associate Laboratory for Green Chemistry
 office 217, tel. +351212948300, ext. 11307 email: rita.castro@gmail.com

short CV / research interests:

I have a master’s degree in Conservation and Restoration at FCT-UNL, where I developed a dissertation about Chinese hand-painted wallpaper from the 18^th century, 2009. Since then, my main area of research has been illuminations and medieval manuscripts, particularly the study of colour, which I started developing within the multidisciplinary project “Colour in medieval illuminated manuscripts: Between beauty and meaning“ – a project funded by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT). Presently, I focused these studies in a PhD: “The Book of Birds in Portuguese scriptoria: preservation and access”, in Conservation Science, with REQUIMTE and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. I am also currently a member of the Instituto de Estudos Medievais, FCSH-UNL.

My main research interests are art history (colour meaning, iconography) and conservation science (characterisation of dyes and pigments, historically accurate reconstructions, medieval illuminations and parchment conservation).

5 selected publications:

https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Rita_Castro/

M. J. Melo, M. Vilarigues, V. S. F. Muralha, R. Castro, "Fernão Vaz Dourado’s colours", in Universal Atlas of Fernão Vaz Dourado. 1571, M. Moleiro Editor, S.A., 2013, 168-186, ISBN: 978-84-96400-85-6   (also published in spanish and french)

M. J. Melo, A. Miranda, C. Miguel, R. Castro, A. Lemos, V. S. F. Muralha, J. A. Lopes and A. e P. Gonçalves, "The colour of medieval Portuguese illumination: an interdisciplinary approach", Revista de História da Arte, FCSH-UNL, nº1, série W, 2011, 152-173, ISSN: 2182-3294