Tate Britain opens retrospective of Paula Rego in summer
The exhibition, which was initially scheduled to open on June 16, is promoted as the largest and most comprehensive retrospective of the work of Paula Rego, who has studied and lived in the UK for several decades.
The museum is currently closed due to restrictions enacted by the Government to control the covid-19 pandemic, and the deconfinition plan does not provide for the reopening of cultural spaces in England until 17 May.
The exhibition will start with a selection of the first Rego works rarely seen, in which the artist explored her own personal problems, but also social issues, such as “Interrogation”, a painting painted at the age of 15.
In the paintings, collages and drawings of the 1960s and 1970s, Rego’s opposition to the Portuguese dictatorship is manifested, using a variety of sources of inspiration, including advertisements, caricatures and news.
From the 1980s, she left the collages and dedicated herself to painting, combining childhood memories with the experiences of woman, wife and lover.
The exhibition will include important paintings from that period, such as paintings from the emblematic series “The Vivian Girls” or “The Policeman’s Daughter”, some of which are the result of Rego’s intense relationship with husband, painter Victor Willing, who suffered from multiple sclerosis during several years and died in 1988.
The exhibition will also show engravings from the 1989 “Nursery Rhymes” series, in which Rego explores the strangeness and cruelty of traditional British children’s songs, and large oil pastels of single female figures from the 1990s to 2000, including the series “Dog Woman” and “Abortion”.
