Ana Maria Pacheco

Who is Ana Maria Pacheco?

Ana Maria Pacheco is a Brazilian artist who works in the United Kingdom. Her work is partly inspired by the troubled period of Brazil's history, culminating in the takeover by the military junta in 1964, to which she was an eyewitness. Pacheco was born to Catholic and Protestant parents, and inspired by central Brazil's rural and rich religious heritage, left by artists such as O Aleijadinho. Combined with such local customs as Cordel literature and Brazilian literature such as Andrade's Macunaíma, Pacheco has long drawn upon the religious tales and the modernist literature of her homeland. Following degrees in both Sculpture and Music in Goiás and Rio de Janeiro, she taught and lectured for several years at Universities in Goiás before she moved to London in 1973 to study at the Slade School of Art; from 1985 to 1989, she was Head of Fine Art at the Norwich School of Art.

Despite also being a painter and printmaker, Pacheco is best known for her multi-figure groups of polychrome sculptures carved from wood. These are typically exhibited as installation pieces and include Man and his Sheep and Dark Night of the Soul, created during her residency at the National Gallery, London as a response to The Martyrdom of Saint Sebastian by the Pollaiuolo brothers.