At first glance, these look like sketches – the kind artists make on the way to something more finished. But that expectation doesn’t quite hold. The drawings assert themselves: restless, unresolved, and often more direct than the paintings they eventually lead to. This is Story Line, the latest exhibition of Paula Rego at the Victoria Miro gallery in London.
Dame Paula Rego was born in Lisbon in 1935, grew up under the Estado Novo dictatorship and later moved to London to study at the Slade School of Fine Art. She spent most of her life in the UK, becoming a central figure in British art while continuing to draw deeply on Portuguese culture and politics.
In 2010, she was made a dame – an indication of just how influential her work had become in Britain. It’s through the work she produced over a lifetime that the exhibition’s title begins to take on its full meaning. Story Line might sound descriptive, but it is something more: a method. It tells visitors how Rego worked and how we are meant to look.
