Lisbon-based Mariana Duarte Santos works in figurative painting, drawing and printmaking. Photographs, cinema, literature and observations of people inform the narratives in her work.
ON THE WALL / MARIANA DUARTE SANTOS
Mariana Duarte Santos and Is a figurative artist from Lisbon, Portugal. She works in oil, pen and water colour and printmaking. Mariana’s work has always been more about the world and her observation of it than about herself and any of her inner feelings/turmoil and her artistic subjects are almost always related to people. In her own words, I’m interested in capturing the way they interact/relate to the world, other people, themselves and their surroundings.
I’m also very drawn to the relationships between the individual and the collective, as well as life’s illusions and constructs. My work typically has a very strong narrative quality to it as I’m often inspired by stories, history, literature and cinema. I try to use fragments and moments in time/space as a suggestion of something bigger, something more or something hidden. Sometimes my paintings can seem very introspective, both in their themes and overall fell, but they’re always based on observation, both of people and the word around them.
I base a good deal of my work in still frames of films and documentaries as well as a huge stack of old photographs I pick up in flee markets/antique shops and pictures I take myself. All these elements are selected, modified and combined to create quiet moments of beauty, mystery, suspense, narratives and suggestions.
1 piece across the festival years
Harry Tempest recorded Dundalk through printing, publishing, photography and drawing. His work at Dundalgan Press and his historical writings preserved a vivid account of the town. Mariana Duarte Santos’ mural remembers the observer, artist and chronicler behind that remarkable record.
Francis Street, DundalkMade possible together Our sponsors & partners
