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Claudio Bravo Camus: Six Paintings

Born in 1936, Claudio Bravo was, until his death in 2011, arguably the most prestigious Chilean painter of his time. A hyperrealist who was heavily influenced by Renaissance and Baroque artists, Bravo is best known for his portraits, still-life paintings, and his series of tied packages. His artwork also included drawings, lithographs, engravings and small sculpture.

After gaining international recognition as a successful society portraitist in Madrid, Bravo moved to New York for a short period in which he held multiple exhibitions. After eleven years in Madrid, Bravo moved to Morocco, where he created two magnificent homes filled with fine art, furniture and objects. Both homes stimulated him creatively and, on occasion, became the theatrical setting for his paintings.

Bravo spent the last 30 years of his life living and working in Morocco, which was to heavily influence his later work.

Claudio Bravo Camus, “Noureddine (Portrait of a Young Man)”, 1983, Oil on Canvas, 57.5 x 45 Inches, Private Collection

Born in 1936, Chilean-born artist Claudio Bravo initially established himself as a society portrait painter in Chile and Spain, but he became better known for his vibrant still lifes of such everyday items as packages, crumpled paper, and draped fabric. Although he lived in Morocco for many years, it was the Spanish classical masters who inspired the provocative style of his hyperrealist paintings.

Though Bravo had some training under Chilean artist Miguel Venegas Cifuentes, he was primarily self-taught. He was only 17 years old when he had his first exhibition in 1954 at Salón 13 in Valparaíso. In the early 1960s Bravo moved to Spain, where he made his living painting portraits on commission, including pictures of Gen. Francisco Franco’s family members.

Bravo had his first New York City show in 1970. Two years later he settled in Tangier, Morocco, where he began to paint landscapes and animals as well as still lifes and portraits. His paintings regularly sold for impressive sums, with his 1967 “White Package” fetching more than $1 million in 2004. Bravo was, although, little known in Chile until a 1994 retrospective exhibition of his work at the Chilean National Museum of Fine Arts. Claudio Bravo Camus passed away in June of 2011 in Taroudant, Morocco.