Roberto Chichorro, 1941
Biography

Roberto Chichorro was born in 1941 in Lourenço Marques (present-day Maputo), Mozambique, and grew up in the Mafalala neighbourhood, a meeting point of cultures during a period of profound transformation for the country.

He began his working life in construction before moving into illustration, painting and set design, gaining early recognition through exhibitions in Lourenço Marques during the 1960s. From 1982 to 1985 he held a Spanish government scholarship to study ceramics and zinc engraving in Madrid, and in 1986 a Portuguese government scholarship brought him to Portugal, where he has lived and worked ever since.

Chichorro's paintings move between figuration and abstraction, built from vivid, sharply African colour and populated by dreamlike, often magical imagery carrying an undercurrent of social and historical commentary on Mozambican life and its struggle for independence. Alongside painting, his practice extends to watercolour, ceramics, zinc engraving and mixed-media collage, and he has illustrated books by African and Portuguese writers.