Casca

Casca, is a self-taught artist born in 1976 in Alverca, Lisbon. He is one of the few Angolan Luso artists in the world of contemporary Angolan national art. From an early age he showed a great interest in the world of art. His father is a musician, his grandfather, a great craftsman and together they inspired him to become an artist.

As a child, he showed early promise in drawing, winning a prize for the best drawing in a school competition at the age of eight. His first contact with paints and brushes happened at sixteen under the influence of a friend who encouraged him to take a course in canvas and porcelain painting.

Prior to becoming an artist, Casca’s background was as a welder and locksmith. These skills are also present in his creative work.

Casca has a strong connection with the African people and their culture, in which the masks are seen as protagonists. His art is a result of a divine vision, listening to nature, signs, clues, thoughts, images, people that appear in his head, clues in dreams, studying myths and spirituality given to us by ancestors. All of this is connected with universal issues, inequality, oppression and an obsession with security.

Casca believes art is able to liberate the human being from individual thoughts, allowing the exchange and union of cultures, perpetuating the thoughts of humanity, adding knowledge, moral, ethical and human values. So that together in the future we support our planet rather than destroy it

Casca began his love of Africa in the 1980s, from stories his family told of life in Angola especially. They would come to Portugal on vacation and he loved it when they stayed as he was fascinated, listening hour upon hour to stories that sent his imagination soaring. He particularly loved Angolan children’s literature, the Kitutos (Kimbundo dialect) about the land and art, which most of the time were exchanged for products that people did not have in Angola.