Raquel Reis | Artist at Mondoir

Nationality: Brazilian

Discipline: painting

Based in: Madrid, ES

Biography

I am a figurative expressionist painter with over 20 years of artistic practice. I studied at EAV Parque Lage in Rio de Janeiro, a reference institution in Brazil, where I developed my artistic foundation over four years. I also hold a degree in Journalism, which informs my observational and narrative sensitivity. My practice spans oil painting and drawing, including works on paper and canvas, through which I explore emotional states, perception, and human psychology. Rather than focusing on hierarchy of medium, my work is guided by gesture, color, and expressive intensity as tools for translating lived experience into image. My artistic trajectory includes exhibitions in Brazil, Portugal, Italy, and Spain, as well as an international residency in France supported by the Brazilian Ministry of Culture. One of my works entered the municipal collection during this residency and is exhibited alongside other resident artists in the city hall. Across my work, figuration functions as emotional translation rather than description, shaped by memory, observation, and unconscious perception

Artist Statement

My paintings emerge from fleeting moments of everyday life—observed gestures, passing expressions, remembered atmospheres, and emotional impressions that remain in memory long after the moment has passed. Working within a figurative language, I do not seek to describe reality but to reconstruct experience through color, structure, and pictorial invention. Human presence is central to my work, not as portraiture, but as an emotional and psychological trace. Gesture, posture, and the relationship between figures become vehicles for exploring inner states and shared human experiences. Color plays a fundamental role in my practice. Influenced by expressionist traditions and by the light and chromatic intensity associated with my Brazilian background, I use contrasts and harmonies to create tension, rhythm, and emotional resonance. For more than two decades, painting has been my way of investigating the complexity of human experience. Each work becomes an autonomous image where memory, sensation, emotion, and structure coexist. Based in Spain for the past year and a half, I continue to develop my artistic practice within an international context.

Exhibitions

Solo exhibitions: 2026 — Casa do Brasil, Madrid, Spain 2009 — Colorida Art Gallery, Lisbon, Portugal 2003 — Galeria Athanase Sarantópoulos, Ribeirão Preto, Brazil 2001 — Chagall Gallery, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil 1999 — Candido Portinari Gallery, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil Selected group exhibitions: 2026 — Occo Art Gallery, Madrid, Spain 2025 — PasspARTout Art Gallery, Pero, Milan, Italy 2025 — Abartium Gallery, Calldetenes (Barcelona), Spain 2011 — Correios Cultural Center, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil 2003 — Art Center, Nova Friburgo, Brazil 2002 — Casa de Portinari Museum, Brodowski, Brazil 2000 — Fundação Teatro Municipal Trianon, Campos dos Goytacazes, Brazil 1999 — Oswaldo Lima Cultural Foundation, Campos dos Goytacazes, Brazil 1998 — Arte & Cia, Casa de Cultura – Universidade Estácio de Sá, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil 1997 — Faculdade da Cidade Cultural Center, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Awards

2016 — Bronze Medal, Brazilian Society of Fine Arts (SBBA), Rio de Janeiro, Brazil 2012 — Art Residency, Maison d’Emma, Saint-Mathieu-de-Trèviers, France Scholarship granted by the Ministry of Culture (Brazil) Open studio exhibition; work held in the collection of the City Hall

Education

Escola de Artes Visuais do Parque Lage (EAV), Rio de Janeiro, Brazil - Visual Arts program (4 years) BA in Journalism, State University of Rio de Janeiro (UERJ), Rio de Janeiro, Brazil Ongoing independent painting practice (20 + years)