In December 2010, Pedro Batista moved to Berlin for 5 months — a strategic change into a highly creative new scenery that inspired him to produce these wonderful and striking pieces.
On some on these paintings, canvas is replaced and/or mixed with raw linen, granting an impressive feel of volumetry in texture.
Large format portraits of Pedro Batista’s Golden Age Series, inspired in Oscar Wilde’s Portrait of Dorian Gray. #2008
More on Pedro Batista’s #GoldenAge series, inspired in Oscar Wilde’s Portrait of Dorian Gray.
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Inspired in Oscar Wilde’s Dorian Gray, this 2008 Golden Age Series captures that late teen’s beauty that freezes momentarily in time, yet soon begins to fade as childlike traits acquire more mature contours.
With a sharp eye for the female figure, Pedro’s portraits can easily be tagged as beautiful fashion illustrations.
Alfred Hitchcock gets his own version in the Twin Series.
More on the amazing Twins Series
In this 2006 series entitled Pantano (=swamp), Pedro evolved these drawings into powerful paintings that breathe distrust.
In 2005, Pedro showcased his work at Beato Studio, a spectacular Open Studio where he used to work, alongside a roll of great Portuguese artists — Valentim Quaresma, Ricardo Quaresma, Tomás Viana, Ricardo Preto, David Lopes and Daniela Ribeiro. A great success!
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Into the blues.. Pedro preparing for his Open Studio exhibition in 2005. More on that tomorrow, stay tuned!
Color livens. Reveals and disguises. And art develops, in size, in stroke, in strike.
Retrospective Journey Day#7
Interestingly, the basis for each of these paintings —now in growing format of 70x40cm— is Pedro himself. Most of these are self-inspired portraits, sketched in front of a mirror, yet mixed with traces from the people in his life. One could say the evolution of these portraits work as a sort of reflective timely biography. A experimental projection of himself onto others and of others onto himself.
It was this newfound focus on portraits, of people close to him, that granted Pedro a trip to São Paulo in 2005, as the winner of an art contest for Mercado Mundo Mix — a cultural marketplace event showcasing new talent.
Back to the right hand.. And that’s when Pedro really started focusing on faces, all kinds. And here began a new journey of portraits and development of characters inspired in real people.
He soon began focusing his work on people, experimenting with different colors and styles. Because really, life is made up of the people around us.
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