June 8, 2022
Paula Rego, Storyteller of Dark Fairy Tales, Dies at 87
Portuguese-British artist Paula Rego, whose powerful figurative paintings confronted folklore, womanhood and politics, died in 2022 aged 87.
Paula Rego, who died in 2022 aged 87, told unsettling stories on canvas. Born in Portugal and long based in Britain, she painted women and girls as fierce, complicated protagonists in scenes drawn from folk tales, nursery rhymes and her own life.
Her work could be tender and menacing at once, tackling subjects others avoided — including a searing series on backstreet abortion that helped shift opinion in Portugal.
A purpose-built museum, the Casa das Histórias, holds her work in Cascais. Rego restored narrative and raw psychological force to figurative painting when both were deeply unfashionable.
Image: “Casa das Histórias Paula Rego - Cascais - Portugal (52519701393)” — Vitor Oliveira from Torres Vedras, PORTUGAL, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.