Centro Português de Fotografia

The building was Porto's Cadeia da Relação, a combined courthouse and prison finished in the 1790s and used as a jail until 1974 - Camilo Castelo Branco, the nineteenth-century novelist, was held here in 1860 on an adultery charge and wrote while inside. It became the Portuguese Photography Centre in 1997, and the conversion left the prison legible: exhibitions hang in the cell corridors, the barred windows and heavy doors remain, and the scale of the granite blocks is the first thing you notice. Shows are temporary, mixing Portuguese and international photography, and admission is free. On the top floor is a permanent camera collection of several hundred devices from the nineteenth century onward, including spy cameras and studio equipment. The combination of a working exhibition space and an intact prison is unusual, and the building carries more weight than the shows in it.

History

On the advice of a working group set up in 1996 by Minister Manuel Maria Carrilho, the Ministry of Culture created the centre, and its first exhibitions opened in December 1997 on the ground floor of the former Cadeia da Relação, Porto's appeal court and jail. After restoration by the architects Eduardo Souto de Moura and Humberto Vieira it took over the whole building in 2001 (Wikipedia, Portuguese Centre of Photography).

The main sights

• The prison - cell corridors, barred windows and granite blocks left legible.
• The camera collection - several hundred devices on the top floor, from the 1800s on.
• The temporary shows - Portuguese and international photography, changing regularly.
• The Camilo cell - the writer's 1860 imprisonment marked in the building.

When to go

Year-round. One to two hours. Free entry. Closed Mondays. Check what is showing, since the programme is entirely temporary.

What to expect

There is no permanent photography collection on display - if the current exhibition does not interest you, only the building and cameras remain. The interior is cold and dim. Stairs between floors, with limited accessibility. Labelling is mainly in Portuguese.

Nearby

Clérigos tower and Livraria Lello are close; the Cordoaria gardens are outside.

Key facts