10 Questions with Nogueira de Barros

Nogueira de Barros is an award-winning artist, born in Almada (Portugal) in 1964. He regularly exhibits, having participated in prestigious collective exhibitions and several individual exhibitions. In 2001, he began exhibiting outside the country, highlighting the city of New York and London. In 2021 he was invited to be part of the international jury at the Torso International Art competition, India.

www.nogueiradebarros.com | @nogueirafineart

ARTIST STATEMENT

Nogueira de Barros works instinctively, most of all with acrylic inks, resin and textures, and colors. The materials are deconstructed using methodically plastic materials - spreading, burning, and dying. Time is invested in its realization: the works can take days, weeks, or months to be created. The works evolve organically. They are constructed with layers of paint, the resin in three-dimensional abstract shapes that hang between object and image. Together they create a unique, visual, and tactile landscape of form, depth, and texture that challenges the spectator to reflect on us and the world.

INTERVIEW

How did you start making art? Do you remember when you realized that you were going to become an artist?

Since I was a kid, I draw and scribble books; my schoolbooks were all drawn with graphics and comic books.

In the eighties, I started to visit galleries and museums and started to look at painting and sculpture with another look, mainly painting. I was fascinated with the light and texture of the brushstrokes of the great masters. I then started with watercolor to paint everyday life and quickly moved on to oil and acrylic.

After a few years, I started to send C.V. and the portfolio looking for exhibitions, and in 1989 I was invited to exhibit in my municipal library.

The exhibition was a success both in visits and in sales, and then I realized that my painting had value and that it had an audience, and I never stopped to show until now. And I had worked around the world. I liked to show my works, being receptive to good and bad reviews.

What is your personal aim as an artist?

My goal is to leave a mark, leave work done, meet my artistic needs, and transpose my entire imaginary world on canvas. I was looking for my limits and boundaries, trying new approaches. Fortunately, my painting is appreciated, and I have managed to sell my production, as I work in medium and large formats. I have already had a career spanning over 30 years with hundreds of works. And finally, I'm looking for the perfect painting, will I make it? I don't know.

In your layered works, you aim at "highlighting the beauty found in the process [of painting] itself." What is the creative process behind these works? And where do you find inspiration?

I get inspired by nature. I like to watch fungi, rust, algae, microorganisms, stars, galaxies, volcanoes, and their lava; we can found abstract images in nature in the deep sea we can see the unimaginable. After searching and loading my brain with these images, I make a few drafts and then leave for the canvas.

I am currently working with the canvas horizontally, and I paint layer by layer. Some works have about 8 to 10 layers of paint. I am an artist who prioritizes color, depth, and texture. My paints must transmit to me joy and ecstasy. When I said: it finished (after 2 to 3 weeks of work), I am completely accomplished and super happy to see the paints agglutinate and transform into worlds, colorful and strong images.

As for the quote "highlighting the beauty found in the process [of painting] itself.": often despite having the palette of colors chosen and the paths, the steps to follow the very energy of the work begins to transform. The paint agglutinates and changes direction, taking my hand to other paths and other shortcuts, showing something that I didn't imagine when I started. In many works, I aim to control the chaos of the painting itself.

Tell us about the materials and techniques that you use. How do you choose them, and do they have particular meanings to you?

At this moment, I use acrylic paints mixed me with some ingredients that I discovered. These days, everything is valid. I use acrylic, watercolor paints, oils, resins, beeswax and, Damar resin.

It depends on the type of work. Before starting, I restrict my color palette and add acrylic layers until the final result ending with resin, use as a support for canvas or wood. When I use collages, the surface is usually wood. The size of the work depends on the reason I chose to represent it. All raw materials are accepted as part of my aesthetic language and against the idea that I conceived for the work or series in question.

What is the most challenging part of your work?

All phases of creation are important, with no one more important than the other, as it is the set of small things that leads to the whole. Still, the last phase, the resin phase, is the most touchy part because if it is not as I want it, I have to destroy the work or take a sander and erase the layers of resin. 

Answering the question is the last layer because there is no way to redo it. While the other layers can touch up, renew.

What do you hope that the public takes away from your work?

I expect, first of all, a joy and admiration when they see the paints, that enjoy the color and depth and movement of the whole body of my work. I hope that my paints help people to be happier transmitting positive energy. My painting is enchanting, it is a little magical, and if people take this magic with them, my goal has been achieved. If those who look at a painting of mine spend more than 1 minute looking at it, it is a sign that the work is communicating with the viewer.

What advice can you give to beginning artists?

Be honest, set goals, and try to achieve those goals, however tortuous, ungrateful they may be. If you want to be artists in their true essence, be prepared for the word "NO," it is the word that is heard the most and for the criticism of those who see the work and do not know the artist's opinion of the unknown.

Do not copy, be unique, authentic because authenticity is the true achievement of an artist.

Do you have an essential philosophy that guides you in your creative expression?

I try to be the most honest in my plastic language, I try to find my way and often the way I choose, it is not the easiest, the solution is difficult and while I cannot find it, there is a restlessness in myself.

I am thinking about how to get to the final, how can I finish, trying, trying again until I find the solution, and in this act, my brain does not rest, I do not sleep, I do not rest, and when the solution appears, I immediately go to the studio and put the solution found into practice. 

I always try to discover new techniques and new approaches to the same theme, so my philosophy is searching for the new. I follow the teachings of the philosopher Epiteto in his Stoicism, how to survive Chaos, how I maintain control over my final purpose. Stoicism leads me to know myself to know my limits. Please show me that I am fully responsible for everything I do and say. 

And that it is I who decides and controls my destruction and my regeneration, my liberation. Just like Fénix is reborn from the ashes, freeing me from chains and dogmas and is therefore totally free without following any isms, art movements. 

What do you think about the art community and market?

The art market is changing, the way of being in art is becoming more democratic and more accessible due to social networks, online galleries, virtual movements. Artists can no longer just paint. They must be “alive” on social networks in the virtual community. The gallery owners are reinventing themselves, as we can now buy art anywhere in the world.

With Covid and confinement, culture practically stopped, at least two years of artistic “LIFE” were lost in practice, physical spaces are closed, and artistic production is only for the virtual market.

And lastly, what are you working on now, and what are your plans for the future? Anything exciting you can tell us about?

I am currently preparing for 2022/23 because although I like to sell, I like to make exhibitions in noble spaces the most. I just closed 2021 with several solo exhibitions.
Highlights will be Oporto City and Lisbon, all in Portugal. The shows are themed on “Landscapes” and will show my worlds of fantasy and lush and colorful landscapes. The flower will be at the center of the works.
I am also in negotiations to make an individual exhibition (2023) with the character of solidarity with a large institution's sponsorship where the proceeds will go to a private institution of social solidarity. I like to be in solidarity and help others. The real reason for art and being an artist is to make this world better and more human, and more colorful. Finally, I want to thank all my supporters and my fans.