Photography: AZUL
“Fantasy home: a Portuguese seaside house filled with the strange sweetness of life” – this is the title of the article published by Property Listings of the renowned British newspaper Financial Times about the house in Quinta Figueiroa Rego where Paula Rego lived for several years.
For Mersiha Bruncevic, author of this article, the life of the artist Paula Rego during the 60s of the 20th century in the Portuguese fishing village presents divided doses of emotion, creative freedom and turmoil – that is, elements that combine to form a fascinating story.
life there felt like an endless dream with eyes open
The article, which contains a photograph of AZUL – Ericeira Mag (Paula Rego’s family home, which we highlight here again), begins by collect “Stories and Secrets” (“Histórias e Segredos”), a 2017 documentary about the life and work of the Portuguese artist, referring that it opens with images from the 1950s of a teenager Paula Rego playing among the waves of an Ericeira beach, possibly Empa, which she was a frequent visitor: “The sand is bright yellow, the sky impossibly blue and the striking cliffs in the background are almost lunar. This is Ericeira, the small Portuguese fishing village where Rego spent most of her childhood”, reads the article on the website belonging to the centenary London newspaper.
The Ericeira house where Paula Rego, who died on June 8, 2022, grew up and lived is the setting for many of her paintings, as Mersiha Bruncevic recalls. Quinta Figueroa Rego residence maintains whitewashed walls and a blue and white tile mosaic on the façade representing the Virgin Mary and the Immaculate Heart.
A Dança, 1988, Paula Rego
In another segment of “Histórias e Segredos” a young and beautiful Paula Rego dances on the terrace with her husband and friends. This scene is repeated as a chorus throughout the film; and it’s the natural bliss of those moments, along with the understated beauty of the vilage, that makes this the perfect fantasy house for the Financial Times journalist.
Mersiha Bruncevic also confesses that she is fascinated by a paradox: according to Nick Willing, son of Paula Rego, the farm was “a sanctuary for artists”, a place of “excitement, sensuality” and “longing” – life there felt like an endless dream with eyes open. But this would not always be a happy place for the artist, as we know: if on one side it was be possible to witness her artistic creation, on the other side, we find not only her husband’s creative blocks but the many affairs that Rego and Victor had while they lived there. Not forgetting, of course, the circumstances that would force Paula Rego to get rid of this family jewel in 1979.
paintings like Rego’s seem impossibly discordant here, like memories of a time or a dream that perhaps never was
The journalist considers that the freedom Paula Rego enjoyed in the 60s makes those days on the estate an ideal, a fantasy: the freedom to create and love is something rare – but during a period of time it seemed to exist in abundance in that space.
The article concludes with a paragraph that refers to the current spirit of the times in Ericeira, transformed into a surfing mecca on a global scale: “Surfboards all over the village are leaning against the whitewashed walls of the houses. Neoprene wetsuits are hanging on clotheslines in the sun with no afternoon shadows. Paintings like Rego’s seem impossibly discordant here, like memories of a time or a dream that perhaps never was. But as we walk along the beaches a woman catches our eye. The black hair and high cheekbones are familiar. Eyes meet for a brief moment and suddenly we are looking at the figure of Paula Rego”, who appears in the left corner of “A Dança”, a painting that has the Fort of Milreu as a background and in which her husband dances with some other woman.
Paula Rego and her husband Vic Willing in Ericeira – ph. Manoela Morais.
You can read the original article in full here.
Esta publicação também está disponível em | This article is also available in: Portuguese (Portugal)
