For over six decades, Paula Rego redefined figurative painting with psychologically charged scenes drawn from folk tales, literature and lived experience. Born in Lisbon in 1935, she came of age under the shadow of Portugal’s Salazar dictatorship — a political context that profoundly shaped her worldview. Sent to a finishing school in Kent, she later enrolled at the Slade School of Fine Art, graduating in 1956. It was there that she met fellow student Victor Willing, who would become both her husband and a key supporter of her work.
Rego’s early paintings fused Surrealism and collage, often confronting themes of authoritarianism and domestic constraint with biting wit. Settling permanently in London in the 1970s, she established herself among a new generation of figurative painters who resisted the dominance of abstraction. A shift in her style came in the 1980s, when she began working primarily in pastel — a medium she mastered with striking expressive force. Works from this period, such as The Maids (1987) and The Dance (1988), mark a turn toward narrative compositions that blend brutality, tenderness and allegory.
In 1990, she became the National Gallery’s first artist-in-residence, and throughout the decade gained wider recognition for her unflinching portrayals of women’s agency and suffering. This culminated in The Abortion Series (1998), a response to Portugal’s failed referendum on abortion rights. In confronting the human cost of illegal procedures, Rego challenged cultural taboos with raw immediacy and empathy.
Influenced by Hogarth, Goya and 19th-century illustration, Rego drew on a wide visual lexicon, yet her language was singular. Her art has been exhibited internationally and is held in the collections of Tate, MoMA and the Gulbenkian Museum. Appointed a Dame in 2010, Rego remained an uncompromising voice in art until her death in 2022.
PAULA REGO (1935-2022)
Dancing Ostriches from Walt Disney's 'Fantasia'
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
Looking Back
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
Broken Promises
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
The Lesson
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
Good Dog
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
Moth
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
Hyacinth - Reclining Hippo from Walt Disney's Fantasia
PAULA REGO (B. 1935)
School for Little Witches
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
A Sereiazinha (The Little Mermaid)
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
Deposition
PAULA REGO (B. 1935)
Portrait of FB
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
The Death of the Blind Sister
PAULA REGO (1935-2022)
Stretched
PAULA REGO (1935-2022)
Untitled
PAULA REGO (B. 1935)
Crate
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
Untitled
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
Birth
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
The Cigarette
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
Girl with Two Mothers
Paula Rego (B. 1935)
The Artist and her Models
PAULA REGO (1935-2022)
Little Girl Showing Off
PAULA REGO (1935-2022)
Untitled
PAULA REGO (1935-2022)
Portrait of Elaine Feinstein
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
Untitled
Paula Rego (B.1935)
Untitled
PAULA REGO (1935-2022)
A Fadista
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
(i)-(vi) Nursery Rhymes, six plates (vii) See-Saw, Margery Daw, one plate
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
Untitled [The Abortion Series] (Rosenthal 160-167)
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
Nursery Rhymes
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
Clubs Diamonds Hearts and Spades
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
Portrait of Cousin Manuela
Paula Rego (B. 1935)
Untitled
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
Peter Pan
Paula Rego (B. 1935)
Goat Girl IV
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
Untitled
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
The Children's Crusade
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
O Vinho (Wine)
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
Untitled (Abortion Series): 7 Plates
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
Untitled
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
Peter Pan
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
Royal College of Art secret postcard
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
Shakespeare's Room
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
Getting Ready for the Ball, from: Jane Eyre
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
Sisters 2
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
Getting Ready for the Ball, from: Jane Eyre
PAULA REGO (1935-2022)
Ride a Cock-Horse, from: Nursery Rhymes
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
Captain Hook and the Lost Boy, from: Peter Pan (Rosenthal 80)
Paula Rego (b. 1935)
Circumcision
PAULA REGO (1935-2022)
Fairy Tale III
PAULA REGO (1935-2022)
Secrets and Stories