Sandra Macieira
Sandra Macieira
(Portuguese - Lisbon)
“Teínas, ossos e outras iguarias” – Drawings
July 20th to August 31st 2024
“The exhibition “Teínas, Bones and Other Delicacies”, by Sandra Macieira, brings together a set of drawings that at first glance, and for the most incautious, seem little to deviate from the record of scientific illustration, with the detail of the tracing in the recomposition of plant and animalistic motifs. But in a second moment, with a sharper look, it is easy to see that there is no desire to index or catalog the species represented but rather an impulse to recover and add the narrative power that is evident from the discovery and reorganization of these elements.
A skull is never just a skull, it is an entity that survives time, the protagonist of other narratives that are constructed by Sandra Macieira, incorporating a wide range of literary and especially visual references, arising from illustration, engraving, in which names such as Lewis Carol/Sir John Teniel, Gustave Doré, Edward Gorey, Benjamin Lacombe, Lauren Marx, Zoe Keller, Marco Mazzoni, Rebeca Dautremer, among others, are possible allusions.
In a discourse that settles, image by image, between the symbolic morbidity of moments evocative of the ephemerality of life (“vita brevis”) and the cuteness (“cute”) of its protagonists, be they animals and their offspring or just their bone structures, everything is always treated with the same delicacy and enthusiasm by the artist. As if he served us the most exquisite delicacy on cut paper doilies, as if he led us to discover, in old biology books, the illustrations that were there and others that we didn't even know existed. With time… As if we were sipping some tea from a porcelain cup.”
By Pedro Salgado
Biologist and Scientific Illustrator
The body of work presented by Sandra Macieira is based on several independent drawing projects, developed in consistent series, both in technical and conceptual approaches.
Over the course of about a decade in which I had the pleasure of closely following Sandra's drawings, I witnessed a permanent search for ideas, challenges, pretexts, to launch into periods of almost obsessive dedication to the practice of drawing. Apart from architecture, his basic training, he found an alternative way of creating other realities on drawing paper, in which a very particular interest in naturalistic drawing becomes evident, a respect for anatomy and biological forms, along with a refined technical mastery of scratching materials. He therefore resorts to his high skills in the field of scientific illustration, to then dive into a universe of his own, in which the transgression of the natural, the unusual and the laughable, are served in fantasy designs illuminated by the realistic trait that he cannot do without.
Sandra Macieira
(Portuguese - Lisboa)
“I am an architect, but I also studied painting and scientific illustration. I participated in several exhibitions, obtaining some awards for scientific and nature illustration. I am constantly present at the House of Science and FIIN (International Nature Images Festival) competitions. The last exhibition I participated in, which is still running since 2020, at the Natural History Museum in Lisbon, “Illustrare: Journeys of Scientific Illustration in Portugal”, featured works by the most renowned illustrators in Portugal throughout time.
The passion for animals is growing stronger and now I want to use the illustration to help protect, alert and be more active in defending animals, trying to prevent their extinction on the planet.
On the other hand, I also have a taste for the strange and bizarre, which sometimes manifests itself in other types of illustrations, mixing animal species, taking advantage of anatomical specificities, or even strange situations, but always linked to the animal world and the cycle of life. , with creation and death. "
EXHIBITIONS
2020/2024
Illustrare: Scientific Illustration Journeys in Portugal
Collective exhibition at the Lisbon Natural History Museum
2023
Nature Drawing - 10 editions, 100 drawings
Collective exhibition at the Lisbon Natural History Museum
2021
Collective exhibition at the Sociedad Gaditana de História
2020
Merit award from Casa das Ciências
Collective exhibition at FIIN – International Nature Image Festival
Artbox.Project in Barcelona.
UN stamps - Endangered Species collection (by invitation)
2019
Collective exhibition at FIIN – International Nature Image Festival
2018
Collective exhibition at FIIN – International Nature Image Festival
Finalist at the House of Sciences
2017
Excellence and Distinction Award at Casa das Ciências
Collective exhibition at FIIN – International Nature Image Festival
Group exhibition at EWA - Exhibition Wildlife Art - England
2016
Collective exhibition at FIIN – International Nature Image Festival
(2nd Prize for nature drawing)
2015
Collective exhibition at the Lisbon Natural History Museum
2014
Collective exhibition at the Lisbon Natural History Museum