"The first painting I ever did was a blue plant over a small white tile"

It was wandering through his Dadaistic thoughts that he came up with his name, feeling that the name of every being hides multiple layers. He doesn’t know if painting is his calling, but his talent and sensibility are evident.

We had a conversation with Albert Tannat whose art inhabits our walls as well as our hearts.

In a society that lives in a constant exhibition, it is quite clear that you like to remain low-key, even choosing to use a pseudonym, Albert Tannat. Does that approach reveal a shy and discreet personality, or do you believe that the only thing that must be relevant is your work?

The name Albert Tannat came up when wandering in Dadaistic thoughts and experiments during the pandemic. At that moment I was working in the Swiss Alps, and one of the workers fell sick, so our boss decided that we should all mark our names in our water bottles to make sure that we wouldn’t get sick as well. At that time, I started to re-create names to identify my bottles. Sometimes it would be RA, another Alberto, and even RA-BERTO, as well as using drawing to identify my bottles. Then for several reasons, I came up with Albert Tannat. The moment that I return home, there was an opportunity to do an exhibition and start using that pseudonym. The reality is that I always liked to use different names to present and develop my work, I feel that the name of every being hides multiple layers.

When did you realize that painting was your calling?

I can’t say if painting is my calling! I paint from a very early age, like all of us. I remember when I was little, I would make lots of sketches of cartoons and offer them to my mother. I would like to have a look at them today!!!! (Laughter) The first painting I ever made was a blue plant on a white tile. But I started to paint more “seriously” while studying philosophy in Lisbon. I have always made drawings, but I also felt the need to express myself artistically through a bigger scale, I think painting comes partly for that reason. However, I have always been kicked out by art centres. The institutions always wanted to keep me far from them, and that distance made me become profoundly closer to art and specifically painting.

From having an idea to materializing it, how does your creative process work?

Generally, I start by making the wood structure and I stretch the canvas over it. It is quite rare for me to have a specific idea about what I am going to paint on a canvas. There is a symbol, an image that is there and makes sense to materialize it, but it is actually during the process of using colour that the shape is revealed. I work mainly with colour. Some days I will paint the base of the painting with three different colours before I find the right starting point. A colour that works on a small canvas sometimes doesn’t work on a big canvas. My pictorial process is always very spontaneous and images start to reveal and surprise me! Sometimes the materialized images surprise me in a way that keeps me from sleeping. The colours get together and shapes are revealed. Some images are so present that they get repeated and transform into others, and many times the small detail of the last finished painting is the starting point for the next one.

How do you come up with ideas for your painting series?

I usually make paintings in series because the images are very strong. Repetition makes part of daily work, also in painting. Small changes in a theme sometimes transform a painting into an extraordinary piece or not. But I generally focus on a specific subject. The images I materialize are almost like memory crutches. They remind me of past moments I have seen and lived, and they make me want to go back to those moments in different ways. I repeat till exhaustion! I repeat it until it doesn’t make sense because the images are experienced in other ways. Many things come from daily life experiences, from taverns for example. During my artist residency in Portimão, I would cross the bridge daily to go to a fisherman’s trailer and have my afternoon glass of wine. The atmosphere was crazy! The smell of fish and all the fishermen that came from the sea and would spend the afternoon chatting in this unbelievable place. I really wanted to translate that into a painting. I could have made a portrait of a fisherman or the owner of the place, but I couldn’t deal with that. I would go there every day trying to get that image, but it just wouldn’t come. I would drink and draw and when arriving at the atelier nothing would happen! I came back, repeated the process, and finally, one day when I arrived at the atelier, I opened a Matisse book and I found his famous painting “The Young Sailor II”, and everything became clear! It wasn’t a young sailor but a young fisherman. I had lived that painting in a bag of sardines. From that experience, I created the painting “Carlos o Pescador”, changed, chewed, and very much experienced. Other ideas I have come from childhood memories that have crystallized in my head. When I was a child, my mother would let me spend entire afternoons riding the merry-go-round horses at Fontaínhas while she was at the café with her friends. She would say “Let the boy ride the horse until I come back!!!”. From that memory, I created the series I have been working on “Flying Horses carousel”.

Besides canvas, your work also extends into fabric compositions and objects. Are these materials complementary to your paintings or are they chosen because they are the ideal vehicle to express a specific idea?

My main focus is painting. The objects that you speak about just jump from the canvas. They couldn’t be paintings, and yet they are part of them. They are small symbols that gain an external dimension of the canvas. To my understanding, different materials have different potentials. I would never work on a painting, a fabric, or a sculpture the same way. Each material has its own specificities, and my interest is to explore those characteristics. It’s not that the material is the ideal vehicle to express an idea, but it becomes ideal.

Find here all Albert Tannat paintings!

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If you could only paint with one material, what would you choose?

I paint with the material I want to. I like the brush and I like the paint (Laughter). I could wear gloves to work, but I like the dirtiness of the paint, pastels, spray, the matter. I have an overall to keep my clothes clean, but, sometimes, there is no time to put it on. The urge to add a little bit of paint is so strong that the overall is left behind.

Who is the artist that you admire the most?

If I would tell you all the artists I have admired and the ones I still do, the list would be endless. There are always, of course, those that last, but it’s difficult to choose, to say a name. I always had a special appreciation for the ones that never had an academic background. A big source of inspiration is the artists I encounter in taverns (Laughter).

In the series “O Touro e a Besta” (The Bull and the Beast) who is the beast?

Isn’t it obvious!!! (Laughter) The human being is a beast!

You told us about Dadaistic thoughts and experiments. Dadaism defied society and the art world, questioning the pre-conceived concepts in all areas and in art specifically. Do you think that because your journey has been outside the academic world, it gave you a bigger sense of freedom as an artist?

I have a big affinity with self-taught artists, although most of my friends studied Fine Arts. I honestly can’t say if it gave me more freedom. I feel that the fact that I don’t have an academic background in Fine Arts allowed me to experiment. Experimentation in the sense of making mistakes. I always liked to learn a little bit of everything. I studied computer science, cinema, and for a short period also academic drawing, music, and philosophy. I have cleaned banks, movie theatres, houses, etc. In this aspect, I feel a bit like a Renaissance man (Laughter). Still, painting is a daily learning process, if it wasn’t, I wouldn’t be painting anymore.  That freedom is associated with my will to not be permanently satisfied with what I do. I always tried to study painting. I remember that in high school I wanted to study Arts at “Soares dos Reis” but my grandfather didn’t allow it. I then tried to get into Plastic Arts in Porto, but I got into Art History. I then applied to do a master’s in painting, but the course did open because of the lack of students. It wasn’t because of my will; it was the institution that didn’t want me there (Laughter).

You said that the urge to add just a little piece of paint is so big that you don’t even have time to dress the overall. Is it easy to decide when a painting is finished?

It isn’t a question of being easy or difficult. It is about time. I have learned this a few years ago, but I keep making the same mistake. Painting happens, but many times in a painful way. I spend a lot of hours in the atelier observing what I do. It sometimes happens That I must add or change something in a painting I had already considered finished. It’s taking a risk. Sketching, erasing. Sometimes I would go home after leaving the atelier with a certain anguish that the painting shouldn’t exist at it was, because it was in a state that I just couldn’t accept. I have learned to deal with it. I think it happens with many painters. I finish the painting when I look and feel it achieved harmony, in my eyes. Some are more persistent than others (Laughter).

Your paintings encapsulate moments that you want to revisit, In the series “Flying Horses Carousel” you paint a lovely memory associated with your mother, how do you translate feelings into colour and shape?

 Yes, as I mentioned my paintings are very autobiographical. They speak about many moments. Some are more distant and hidden in my memory, others more immediate. Sometimes all it takes is paying attention to a cat in a shop window or some kind of advertising, and it might belong to a painting the same day. You make me a difficult question!!! I would say that colour comes first and allows the shape to reveal. What happens is that the painting doesn’t have a predefined destiny and it is for that reason, that my work is made out of many collages. Collages of moments, references, stories. Feelings are fragmented and translated into small details. To read a story you must read several paintings. For that reason, I usually work with series, and it happens quite often that a small detail of a painting is the starting point for a new painting. I am constantly revisiting myself.

What makes tavern “artists” so interesting?

Taverns to me are like “live paintings”. Besides the wine and good conversation (Laughter), there is a lot of transparency and spontaneity in those places. Peculiar moments take place!!! Imagine a place with a plastic fruit bowl on the window. You get in and on your left is a woman seating with her chin on the table. On the right side is a long metal counter. Everyone is screaming!!! An intense smell of cured ham and grease. The place is small but serves meals. The cook taps intensely with a spoon in the glass when food is about to be served. The waiter is in a bad mood because he's tired of dealing with crazy people. On the window, they announce they sell deserts, but they only serve apples, oranges, and pineapples. I think that this scenario for me has a certain beauty and that is why I find here a big part of my inspiration.

At Pura Cal, we assume Soul is a defining element of our work, this element is very present work, which we appreciate so much. When it comes to your house and your atelier are they also a reflection of your soul? Of the objects that surround you which are special to you and why? 

For me, there is no distance between what I do and what I am. It is a reflection of what I live and what I believe in. I always had the will to make things. I made my bed, the shelves for my atelier, tables, chairs, etc. I think that part of this I learned from my grandfather on my father’s side. It’s funny, I remember my grandfather sitting with his thick glasses playing solitary, surrounded by small wooden sculptures he used to make. After working several years in an elevator workshop, he then dedicated his time to making small wooden sculptures: boats, garden benches, and replicas of well-known monuments. Very elaborate things! He worked in his closed balcony with a very small chair that he built. Although he was surrounded by heavy pieces of furniture, he had a sort of shrine, which was a balcony at Bairro da Lapa. I try not to attach to objects, but if I had to choose something I would choose a little sailboat with light in the interior built by my grandfather.

Find here all Albert Tannat paintings!