.png)
Inside the Studio: Luiz Henrique Azevedo
Art is not just about representation—it’s about perception, memory, and emotion. For Luiz Henrique Azevedo, painting is a journey that bridges past and present, reality and abstraction. With early influences from the Flemish school and Impressionism, his work captures the interplay of light, color, and form in deeply personal ways. Whether exploring childhood nostalgia, philosophical reflections, or the serene beauty of landscapes, Luiz’s canvases are a dialogue between technique and sentiment.
In this Inside the Studio interview, Luiz takes us through his artistic evolution, from his roots in drawing and oil painting to his continued quest for new symbols and abstract expressions.
Read on to learn more in an exclusive interview with Luiz Henrique Azevedo :
1. Your journey in art began with a love for drawing and later evolved into oil painting, influenced by the Flemish school and Impressionist painters. Can you share more about this evolution and how these influences have shaped your artistic style?
The act of drawing has always been present. Comics were my first teachers. I was fascinated by the drawings of Harold Foster, Alex Raymond, Lee Falk, among others. In pencil, I made my own stories.
My father had the Belles-Artes collection (I still have it today), made up of 15 volumes. Each of these volumes addresses a specific era or avant-garde, such as Flemish and Dutch Painting or Impressionists and Post-Impressionists. These books became a frequent source of inspiration for me, where the presence of famous artists such as Rembrandt, Gainsborough, Renoir, and others enchanted me.
Rembrandt conveyed technical care, Renoir his joy. Then I arrived at oil painting. At that time, copying an accurate figurative representation of a scene shaped my artistic style, and I didn’t even know it. The search for a more precise pictorial technique was the goal of those times, but it was not achieved.
Those times are gone, but the presence of the Flemish school and the spontaneity of the Impressionist canvases remained as two poles that needed to meet in me. Other readings, other schools, such as French Art or English and North American Art until 1900, did not change this principle. It was the beginning of my relationship with the history of painting and with painting itself.
2. After a career in engineering, you returned to painting in 2001. How did this transition impact your creative process and the themes you explore in your work?
When I started painting again, I was concerned about learning how to paint. A difficulty inherent to my training as an engineer arose—I always tried to see my oil works from the perspective of a formula, a canonical model, typical of an engineering background.
This freedom to create a work, to conduct gestures with the brush, to create colors based on a spontaneous model, took a while to develop. I had to abandon knowledge that, in that area, was not necessary for me. It was another way of shaping thought.
As for my themes, they were not affected by this transition. They are inherent to my life, like my lost childhood, existentialist philosophy, Fernando Pessoa’s poetry. The themes ended up being distributed into four basic lines, but above all, there is the pleasure of painting:
Personal themes – where childhood resides, affective memory, philosophical themes, and poems.
Portraits – a long-time passion.
Landscapes and corners – from the city of my childhood, from the city where I live, from the landscapes that seduce me.
Still lifes – inspired by the works of Melendez, Velázquez, Renoir, and Monet, always inviting me to a new painting.
3. Your work often reflects personal perceptions of self, landscapes from your childhood city, and explorations of light in still-life compositions. How do these themes interconnect, and what draws you to them?
An interesting question. The elaboration of my works touches, here and there, on the themes I mentioned above. I read a poem, an idea emerges, it gains strength and moves on to the composition phase.
While this is happening, another canvas is in the painting phase on the easel, and another in the composition phase. The idea and the analysis permeate all the phases of an elaboration. Some ideas remain, gain strength, while others fade away.
A visit to the city of my childhood, crossing a bridge, the light on the river, Monet. Thoughts from different branches are connected in my mind. A beautiful bridge that does not belong to me may be a beautiful painting, a technical challenge, but it is empty. It needs to sustain itself either by its beauty or by its peace.
Still lifes, in addition to their historical significance, portray the vases and objects present in my life.
4. In your recent efforts to translate perceptions of reality into abstractions, what challenges and discoveries have you encountered?
I wanted to represent these perceptions after reading Modern Art and getting to know abstract art through Mathew Collings and Gerhard Richter. I needed a new language, new symbols.
The first appeared in Abstract Painting No. 1 - Self-Portrait and Hope, where the blue margin represents childhood, moving through the orange tones, through life, until its end. I’m at a point on that trajectory, hence the title.
It is impressive how more complex themes, through these new symbols and this freedom, managed to be pictorially represented. The painting Childhood Topics: Love (Based on Abstract Painting No. 1) was born. Note that blue predominates in the work. This expressionism is contained in the blue margin, childhood, of Abstract Painting No. 1.
5. Your paintings exhibit a concern for lines, shadows, and the harmony of colors. Can you elaborate on your approach to composition and how you achieve balance in your work?
I believe this question is related to composition. Once an idea is defined, it will be composed. I seek balance in the abstract lines and in the lines that will appear concretely, whether in vases or in a landscape, directing towards the focus of the work.
Once this stage is completed, I establish the light that will be directed over the areas and objects in question. As for colors, I seek their harmony alongside a dissonant color. I create a low, abstract intensity, and from this point, the colors slowly gain intensity, in harmony with the intensity of the light. This also applies to the other parameters of color.
Caution is needed when projecting tones and temperatures, as if it were a puzzle. When placing a color, its impact immediately spreads to the others. Always be cautious, and don’t rush.
6. You have participated in various exhibitions, including a solo show in 2006. How have these experiences influenced your artistic journey and the public reception of your work?
I felt gratified to see all the paintings I had worked on since 2001 on the walls of my 2006 exhibition, Estudos e Reflexões (Studies and Reflections). These artworks, placed side by side like a collection, gave me a vision I had not known before—amplifying the strength of the themes.
The beauty of the journey of light through the colors of objects, through childhood compositions, or through landscapes, was a larger theme that revealed my effort in each canvas. Remembering Jan van Eyck: "Als Ich Can."
The reception of this exhibition truly impressed me. Not only on the day of its opening, with everyone present, but also in the attendance book, which recorded so many visits throughout the duration of the show.
7. Your piece Itaipava (2006) captures a serene landscape. Can you discuss the inspiration behind this work and its significance in your portfolio?
This work remains, to this day, a landmark of an era. Sitting in the living room, enjoying those days, I observed the light that permeated the curtain, also passing through the bouquets, to rest on the mantle... with flowers!
"Seeing is not looking," Monet told us. It didn’t take long for me to realize that I was in front of a beautiful composition that brought with it peace. I worked hard in those days, hoping to have this work ready for the 2006 exhibition, and it worked. There it was.
8. Looking ahead, are there new themes, techniques, or projects you are excited to explore in your future work?
Well... I plan to produce a series of paintings in the short term, even in a larger size than usual, addressing the dawn and dusk on Leblon Beach.
Plays of light in shades of blue, green, and orange, forming gradients, where the presence of the sky will be more prominent. As for the technique, this series will move away from dealing with details and settle on a figurative middle ground.
Time will tell if it worked. I hope so.
Luiz Henrique Azevedo’s art is a testament to the power of seeing beyond the surface. His canvases invite us to pause, reflect, and engage with the emotions embedded in light, color, and composition. As he looks ahead to larger-scale projects exploring the shifting tones of dawn and dusk over Leblon Beach, one thing remains certain—his art will continue to evolve, surprise, and resonate.
Stay tuned for more from this visionary artist, and immerse yourself in his world of visual storytelling.
You can learn more about Luiz Henrique Azevedo’s and his work via these links: Instagram: @luiz.henrique.azevedo Facebook: @Luiz Henrique Da Rocha Azevedo
Website: @LuizHenriqueAzevedo
Comments