João Timóteo da Costa

João Timóteo da Costa (1879 – 20 March 1932) was an Afro-Brazilian painter and decorative artist. His artstyle tended to be more academic and impressionist, and he was a well known artist from the late nineteenth century to the early twentieth century. Black artists were often poorly treated, but despite that it was one of the few ways to move up the social hierarchy. His parents, with no ties to enslavement, sent their sons to the first training classes ever held at the ENBA, the brothers of João Timóteo da Costa. João Timotheo da Costa was in a family that pushed to be involved in the arts, his grandfather Henrique Alves de Mesquita was a black musician, composer, and conductor, and he was taught at the Paris Conservatory during the 1850s. The Escolas Nacional de Belas Arts was established in order to spread the education and culture of the arts, and the da Costa brothers enrolled there despite the difficulties of being a black artist.