Afonso Rocha

Exploring the intricacies of social and interpersonal relationships, through the lens of irony and humour, Afonso Rocha’s practice relies on painting to create dissected portraits of contemporary life. Different layers of information, references, and ideas are consecutively placed atop one another, creating new compositions characterised by their contradictory and emotional ambiguity. Intimate matters and recollections are often important sources for visual concepts, but references span from literature and photography to social media, cartoons, erotic representations, among many others.

Simultaneously, by mixing references from the history of art with contemporary culture, Rocha’s paintings endeavour to question the legacy of Western Art while creating a semi-idealized reality that contrasts with the vulnerability established between figures. Through these scenarios Rocha’s practice delves into subjects of childhood, banality, masculinity and desire whilst exploring sexual politics and questioning stereotypical social and familial roles.

Afonso Rocha (b. 1999, Portugal) lives and works in London, UK. He received an MA in Fine Arts from the City & Guild of London Art School in 2024 and a BA (Hons) from the Porto Faculty of Fine Arts in 2021, with a semester-long stay at the École des Beaux-Arts de Paris.

Rocha has been awarded prizes including the prestigious Elizabeth Greenshields Foundation Grant, the ACS x City & Guilds Studio Prize, a Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation Grant for Studies Abroad, the D. Fernando II Painting Award, an Innovate Artist Grant Honourable Mention and an ArtsinSquare Grant. In 2023 he was shortlisted for the Jackson’s Painting Prize, exhibiting at the Bankside Gallery, London. He recently had his first institutional solo show “No Jardim” at the Sintra Museum of Arts in Lisbon, Portugal.

Rocha’s work has been included in multiple exhibitions and is held in public and private collections in Portugal, UK, Spain, France, Brazil and Luxembourg.