Several century-old portraits have been given new life by British artist Charlie Holt, who has reimagined them as if they had been “revisited by American pop art artist Andy Warhol”.
The reworked portraits are currently on display at São Brás de Alportel’s Costume Museum as part of an exhibition titled ‘Marilyn Revisited’.
“I was invited by the director of the museum, Emanuel Sancho, to create a new project based on any aspect of the museum. I had freedom to roam in the storerooms of the museum. These rooms are filled with all sorts of objects: old pairs of shoes, boxes of records, old radios, cameras … and, of course, the collection of costumes for which it is well known,” says the artist.
“I chose a pile of 1920/30s women’s magazines. On each front cover is a photograph of a lady of fashion. These portraits seemed to be fixed in time, all belonging to a bygone era, so I decided to give them a facelift and recreate them as though Andy Warhol, the American pop artist, had revisited them,” he adds.
The exhibition allows the visitor to see the original magazines and how they have been transcribed digitally.
‘Marilyn Revisited’ can be visited until November 17 during the museum’s opening hours: Monday through Friday from 10am to 1pm and 2pm to 5pm, and on weekends and holidays from 2pm to 5pm.
Tickets cost €2.50 and admission is free for children aged 12 and younger.
Charlie Holt has worked in the Algarve for over 30 years, although he has been exhibiting his work all over Europe and even as far as India.
His work is inspired by “pop art dada and surrealism” and has revolved in recent years mostly around mixed media collage and digital collage.
Charlie organised street art shows for Loulé’s popular MED Festival for around 12 years and also worked on a museum project called ‘Backwards Archaeology’, which has been exhibited at 10 museums in the Algarve.
His next “big show” will be at the Santo António Convent in Loulé, which he describes as a “huge one person show which will present a selection of works from the last 30 years created here in Loulé”.
The artist also has a permanent show on display at Gosto Interiors in Boliqueime.
More information about Charlie and his work can be found online
By Michael Bruxo
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