Portugal NOW! Launches Xochi Art Gallery with a Celebration of Contemporary Portuguese Art

A powerful new voice has joined the art world with the opening of Xochi Art Gallery in Vale de Amoreira. Marking its grand debut, the gallery launched with the exhibition Portugal NOW!, a compelling showcase of seven visionary Portuguese artists who together represent the cutting edge of Portugal’s dynamic contemporary art scene.

The exhibition opened on April 19, 2025, transforming the space into a vibrant meeting ground for artists, collectors, and the public. Running until May 15, Portugal NOW! features a wide range of practices—from large-scale expressionist portraiture to digital abstraction, sculptural installations, and material-based conceptual work.

Introducing the Artists of Portugal NOW!

Mário Henrique (b. 1983) is a prolific portraitist known for his large-scale, expressionist paintings. His dynamic style captures fleeting human expressions and behaviors through gestural techniques—dripping, splashing, and spontaneous mark-making. Working on rough, unconventional surfaces like cardboard or reversed canvases, Henrique explores the tension between control and accident, creating emotionally resonant portraits that exist between representation and abstraction.

João Marques (b. 2001) focuses on “Terra” (earth) as both medium and metaphor. Deeply inspired by arte povera, his work uses scorched soil, charcoal, and other natural materials to reflect on cycles of destruction and rebirth. Marques invites viewers to look not upward for transcendence but downward—to the earth, as a source of sustenance, memory, and regeneration. Winner of the National Young Creators Prize in 2021, he’s an emerging voice in Portuguese art.

Tatyana Cristina (b. 2001) constructs layered abstract worlds through mixed media. Her works blend gestural spontaneity with painstakingly selected visual fragments, creating imaginative spaces rich with memory, irony, and emotional weight. Her paintings act as visual diaries, bridging past and present, chaos and order, inviting viewers into a reflective and surreal inner landscape.

Thierry Ferreira (b. 1970) is a sculptor whose practice spans sculpture, drawing, and photography. Through his exploration of space and form, Ferreira creates works that echo ancient architecture, transitional dwellings, and imagined habitats. His materials—often seemingly rigid—become poetic vessels, speaking to human movement, memory, and the passage of time. His public sculptures span continents, and his work interrogates both visible and invisible structures of place.

Unknownezqui (Rúben Barros) (b. 2003) is a digital artist whose work captures abstracted impressions of people, places, and moments. Working from his own photographs and layering them through digital manipulation and hand-drawn elements, Barros creates images that feel both familiar and strangely new. His mobile creative process—shaped by immediate surroundings—results in pieces that challenge perception and embrace ambiguity.

Francisco Figueiredo Lopes (b. 1998) explores the boundaries between creation and destruction in sculpture and installation. His practice combines industrial materials and handcrafted techniques to probe systems of violence, labor, and consumption. From his Power Tool series to Attached, his work critiques the aestheticization of violence and investigates the underlying forces that shape our social and industrial landscapes.

Miguel Basto (b. 2005) engages directly with urban debris and found materials to create sculptural compositions that reflect on movement, transformation, and human presence within the built environment. His intuitive process reclaims discarded objects, giving them new life and context. With a focus on physicality, composition, and impermanence, Basto’s work challenges viewers to see the poetry in the fragments of everyday urban life.

A New Cultural Beacon in Vale de Amoreira

Xochi Art Gallery has quickly made its mark with this ambitious debut, positioning itself as a vibrant new cultural venue committed to international and cross-disciplinary artistic voices. The gallery’s mission is to serve as a bridge between global innovation and local engagement—making high-caliber contemporary art accessible to all.

The opening night, accompanied by a live DJ set by Norte Harder, captured the spirit of this mission: creative, collaborative, and community-driven. The evening blended art, music, and conversation, creating an atmosphere that was as thoughtful as it was celebratory.

With daily hours from 10:00 AM to 10:00 PM and free admission, Portugal NOW! offers visitors the chance to explore some of Portugal’s most exciting contemporary talent in a setting designed to inspire reflection and dialogue.

Portugal NOW! is more than an exhibition—it’s the start of a bold artistic journey, one that establishes Xochi Art Gallery as a vital new space in the international art landscape.

For more information, visit www.xochi.art.