O pedinte

This sculptor received the International Prize in Black Sculpture in the First World Festival of Negro Arts, Dakar, 1966. He was from a poor family and began his artistic education as Mario Cravo Junior´s assistant (Salvador, Bahia, 1923). His work presents striking influences by African themes that he got to know through a book of photographs on African themes left by Pierre Verger in the studio where he was an apprentice. According to the art critic Clarival do Prado Valadares his work should be seen as an original expression coming from his own unique style, rather than related to some kind of regional African style.