Ana Maria Pacheco
Ana Maria Pacheco was born in Goias, Brazil, in 1943. She studied sculpture at the University of Goias (1963-64) while at the same time studying music at the Federal University of Goias. This was followed by further studies in music and other subjects at the University of Brazil, Rio de Janiero, in 1965. In 1966, she returned to Goias where she lectured at the School of Fine Arts and the School of Architecture at the University of Goias, and at the Institute of Art at the Federal University there until 1973. In 1973, Ana Maria Pacheco left Brazil for Britain. Here, with the support of a British Council Scholarship, she studied under the figurative sculptor, Reg Butler, at the Slade School of Fine Art in London until 1975. Since that time, she has developed her career as a sculptor, painter and printmaker in Britain. Teaching posts have included being Head of Fine Art at Norwich School of Art, Norfolk, from 1985 to 1989.
From 1980, Ana Maria Pacheco has exhibited world-wide. In Britain, significant exhibitions include the Hayward Annual (1982), and solo exhibitions at the Icon Gallery, Birmingham (1983), Camden Arts Centre, London, and the Museum of Modern Art, Oxford (1991), the Gas Hall, Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery (1994) and the City of Plymouth Museums and Art Gallery (1995).
Life is a series of journeys, and the most significant so far for Ana Maria Pacheco must have been her transition from Central Brazil to Britain. It took a long time for her, having made this drastic change, to find her way within her work. Journeying is a recurrent theme in Pacheco's work, together with mysterious narratives, melodramatic encounters, sexuality, death, power, magic and secrets.