About

Ana Carneiro is a Portuguese artist based in London, working primarily with acrylic on paper and canvas. Her practice explores colour, movement and atmosphere, often drawing on memories and impressions of the natural world.

She studied Art & Design at Escola Artística Soares dos Reis in Porto before moving to London, where she completed a BA (Hons) in Product Design at Central Saint Martins. Her background in art and design continues to inform an interest in material, composition and the physical construction of an image.

Alongside her art practice, she works in sustainable product consultancy, bringing together interests in design, making and our changing relationship with the natural world.

Practice

I paint to make sense of conflicting feelings about the world around me, using colour and loose gestures as the means to express what I otherwise struggle to word. I am interested in the way colour can evoke a sense of place or memory without describing it literally, creating compositions that move between abstraction and something half-recognised.

In some works, I cut and reconstruct the painted surface. This process disrupts the original composition: gestures no longer quite align, transitions are interrupted and something initially fluid becomes fragmented. I am drawn to the tension this creates between harmony and disruption, and between what feels familiar and what has subtly shifted.

The natural world is a recurring presence in my work, but rarely as a direct subject. Instead, I am interested in atmosphere, perception and the emotional associations we attach to landscapes, seasons and colour—and in how those associations can coexist with an awareness that the environments around us are changing.

I am inspired by Brazilian Contemporary Art with its bold colour and sentiments, as well as by the “W Series” by Palatnik and his work to discipline visual chaos through perception.