Bruno Pacheco

Bruno Pacheco's paintings explore form, color, and space, encouraging viewers to engage in a dialogue with specific moments or objects.

Biography of Bruno Pacheco

Bruno Pacheco was born in Lisbon, Portugal, in 1974. The artist studied painting at the Lisbon School of Fine Art and earned an MFA from Goldsmiths, University of London, in 2005.

Pacheco took part in the Caribic Residency in Lisbon (2011) and received the Red Mansion Foundation Prize from the Royal College of Art in London (2004). Other awards and fellowships include:

• Poskett Family Fellowship, London (1999-2008);
• Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Lisbon (2000-2001);
• Prémio União Latina, Portugal (2005);
• Botín Foundation grant, Spain (2018-2019).

His recent solo exhibitions have been held at various venues worldwide, including Hollybush Gardens in London, Pedro Cera in Lisbon, Galeria Filomena Soares in Lisbon, Culturgest in Porto, Galeria Quadrado Azul in Porto, and Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian in Lisbon.

Bruno Pacheco's works have been featured in numerous group shows, including "Between glances, (un)common encounters" at Centro de Arte Moderna Gulbenkian and the Alcântara Library in Lisbon (2023), "Neglected: Works from the Norlinda and José Lima Collection" at Centro de Arte Oliva in São João da Madeira (2023), "Itinerarios XXVI" at The Centro Botín in Santander (2021), and many more.

Currently, the artist divides his time between Lisbon, Portugal and London, UK.

Bruno Pacheco's Famous Paintings

The artists's notable works include "Folding Box" (2010), "Leftovers" (2014), "Boletus" (2018-2020), "Marvel" (2019-2020), "In a flash" (2022), among others.

"Boletus" (2018-2020) depicts a range of mushroom-like shapes, both grouped and alone in a neutral setting. This composition produces a collective portrait effect, emphasizing the communal aspect of the fungi and the vivid, artificial quality of the backdrop.

"Marvel" (2019-2020) portrays art handlers transporting Domenico Tintoretto's painting "The Dream of St. Mark" (c. 1570), which features an angel dramatically hovering above St. Mark in his sleep.

Pacheco's latest series of paintings, titled In a Flash (2022), features a unique approach where each painting includes another painting within it, manipulated by a peripheral figure. These inner compositions are inspired by majolica plates and explore narratives centered on metamorphosis. Each painting creates a mise en abyme, embedding images within images to provoke meta-reflections on the nature of the painting medium itself.

Bruno Pacheco's Art Style

Portuguese artist Bruno Pacheco is known for his distinctive ambiguity in representation. Although his work is predominantly figurative, his paintings and drawings often reveal anonymity in their subjects, whether they are human figures or everyday objects. Renowned for depicting groups, crowds, or solitary figures navigating unknown landscapes or engaged in enigmatic activities, Pacheco's work frequently evokes a subtle sense of anxiety and melancholy.

A key focus in Bruno Pacheco’s practice is the mimetic potential of painting. This concern is explored both conceptually and formally. Conceptually, his work examines the history of representation in painting and the boundaries of pictorial illusion. Formally, Pacheco’s practice is marked by the repetition of motifs across multiple works. From everyday subjects to classical references, he produces numerous paintings centered on a single focus, such as fungi, wetsuits, canonical murals, or historical tapestries. This process involves a 'neutralisation' where figure and ground seem to merge, disrupting traditional visual hierarchies and perspectives.