Ânia Pais’s work steps firmly into a mountain home. Her body of work, created through many hands, redraws the strength of the family weave. The possibility of returning to the place where she grew up is its driving force, while the journey of discovering her own history sets the rhythm for the delicate resilience of her pieces. From the earth to the skin, the feminine power of her work mirrors the grandmothers and the trees she grew up alongside, giving rise to a morphological imaginary in which memories of a former regime intersect with the bodies of resistance that guide her.
The land and those who inhabit it are one. The hands that cultivate it and the land itself are one.
Ânia Pais proposes an imaginary of unity and security, rooted in the foundations that sustain her as she looks towards the mountains at the far end of the valley. Dismantling as a working method is, in itself, a commitment to a place of feminine resistance, shaped by women, men and nature, together since the beginnings of her village.
Filipa Morgado
Born in 1998, São Miguel, Azores, Portugal.
Lives and works between Lisbon and Atalaia (Covilhã), Portugal.
EDUCATION
2020 - 2023 - MA in Painting, Faculty of Fine Arts, University of Lisbon, Portugal.
2016 - 2020 - BA in Painting, Faculty of Fine Arts, University of Lisbon, Portugal.
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2026 - Começo, meio e começo, Solo Project, Galeria Belo-Galsterer, Lisbon - PORTUGAL
2025 - Shadows of the Landscape, curated by Gabriela Moldovan, Contemporar Gallery, Cluj-Napoca - ROMANIA
2025 - Enxoval, Segundas na Z, Galeria Zé dos Bois, Lisbon - PORTUGAL
2023 - Mover a Terra, CAU – Cortém Aldeia Urbana, Caldas da Rainha - PORTUGAL
2023 - Epígrafe, Municipal Library of Covilhã - PORTUGAL
2023 - O que ficou, curated by Inês Rebeca and Mariana Baião Santos, Espaço Cultural Mercês, Lisbon - PORTUGAL
2023 - In Perpetuum, Cisterna, Faculty of Fine Arts, University of Lisbon - PORTUGAL
2021 - In Perpetuum, Library of the Faculty of Sciences and Technology, NOVA University Lisbon - PORTUGAL
GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2026 - CONTEXTILE - International Contemporary Textile Art Biennial, Guimarães - PORTUGAL
2026 - Territórios sem Fronteiras, International Art Biennial of Cerveira, Vila Nova de Cerveira - PORTUGAL
2026 - PACHARAMA, Centro de Artes, Caldas da Rainha - PORTUGAL
2025 - JOV'ARTE 2025, Galeria Vieira da Silva, Loures - PORTUGAL
2025 - Dar a Palavra, Military Museum of Elvas - PORTUGAL
2025 - MANIF, Coimbra Court of Appeal and Supreme Court of Justice - PORTUGAL
2025 - BILP - Biennale Internationale du Lin de Portneuf, Québec - CANADA
2025 - Linha Ténue, Casa das Artes Bissaya Barreto, Coimbra - PORTUGAL
2025 - Nectário, curated by Catarina Neves Ricci, PLATO, Évora - PORTUGAL
2025 - O fio que nos une, Museum of Contemporary Art of Elvas - PORTUGAL
2024 - A Casa, Festival Clarão, Lisbon - PORTUGAL
2024 - Quimera, Festival Absurda, Arcos de Valdevez - PORTUGAL
2024 - Bem-vindo a Casa, MAR MOTTO, 9th edition, Faro - PORTUGAL
2024 - Sempre e Nunca Mais, curated by Ana Cachola and Tiago Candeias, Museum of Contemporary Art of Elvas - PORTUGAL
2023 - PREMIÈRE, Centro de Arte Oliva, São João da Madeira - PORTUGAL
2023 - Habitar o Entre, Galeria Municipal Jovem, Vila Franca de Xira - PORTUGAL
2022 - Small Changes, Big Impact, Washington Dulles International Airport, Washington, DC - UNITED STATES
2022 - PREMIÈRE, Centre d’Art Contemporain Abbaye Saint-André, Meymac - FRANCE
2022 - The Female Thread, Emerge Revelations in Virtual Convergence
2021 - Αδράνεια ΙΙ, Hotel Bageion, Athens - GREECE
2019 - Contemporary Interventions on Memory - Dialogue and Silence, Faculty of Fine Arts, University of Lisbon - PORTUGAL
2019 - Elogio da Matéria, Sociedade Nacional de Belas Artes, Lisbon - PORTUGAL
ART FAIRS
2026 - Contemporary Istanbul, Francisco Fino Gallery - TURKEY
2026 - ARCOlisboa, Helena Rodrigues Gallery - PORTUGAL
ARTIST RESIDENCIES
2026 - Patrimónios em Trânsito - Memória, Terra e Corpo, artistic residency between Cape Verde, São Tomé and Príncipe and Portugal, Porto de Mós - PORTUGAL
2026 - O gesto de fazer o ninho, Cultivamos Cultura, São Luís, Odemira - PORTUGAL
2026 - CAU Artistic Residency, Peruvian Amazon and Altiplano, with the Shipibo-Konibo and Aymara communities - PERU
2025 - BILP - Biennale Internationale du Lin de Portneuf, Québec - CANADA
2025 - STUDIOTOPIA 2.0 - Enter the Symbiocene, Cluj-Napoca - ROMANIA
2023 - RAMA Grant - Artistic Residencies, Fundação Millennium bcp / Carpe Diem Arte e Pesquisa - PORTUGAL
2023 - CAU - Cortém Aldeia Urbana, Caldas da Rainha - PORTUGAL
AWARDS
2025 - 2nd Prize, JOV'ARTE Young Art Biennial, Galeria Vieira da Silva, Loures - PORTUGAL
2025 - PRIX SIMONS, BILP - Biennale Internationale du Lin de Portneuf, Québec - CANADA
2023 - RAMA - Young Art Prize, Fundação Millennium bcp / Carpe Diem Arte e Pesquisa - PORTUGAL
GRANTS | SUPPORT | SELECTIONS
2026 - Internationalisation Support, DGARTES, Ser Campo, XI São Tomé and Príncipe Biennial of Arts and Culture 2027 - PORTUGAL / SÃO TOMÉ AND PRÍNCIPE
2025 - STUDIOTOPIA 2.0 - Emerging Artists, international selection, Creative Europe
2024 - Artistic Creation Grant, Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, O gesto de fazer o ninho - PORTUGAL
2024 - Project Rooms, Porto Photography Biennial - PORTUGAL
2024 - PEA - Portuguese Emerging Art - PORTUGAL
2022 - Young Creators, MOSTRA - PORTUGAL
2019 - SGPCM Prize, FBAUL - PORTUGAL
COLLECTIONS
António Cachola Collection
Cultivamos Cultura Collection
Loures Municipal Collection
Porto Municipal Art Collection
Also held in private collections in Portugal, Germany and Brazil.