We had the good fortune of connecting with Bruna Pereira and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Bruna, let’s start by talking about what inspires you?
I’m inspired by the the concept and the passion in the Naïve (Naïf) movement, specially from Brazil and Latin America. For many year I belittled and discredit my work as an artist for not being an academic trained painter. The insecurity of not having a university degree to prove or legitimize what I was yearning to ilustrate delayed my idendity process. Once I learned about these artist in history who’s just painting with the same competence as any other, and with the vivid colors, strokes and life as my culture has, it was a motivacional point for me, and what kept me going any time I doubted myself.

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
I’m a self taught visual artist, from Curitiba, a city in Brazil. I started as a tattoo artist when I was 21, and from that I had the opportunity to learn all kinds of art expressions, like nankin painting and woodcut. By 2017 I got really into traditional japanese tattoos and automatically to oriental folk art. And from that my mind just opened to folk art in general and the wealth of the stories in every part of the world. The myths, the supertisions, the popular tales and characters.

The transition to get to this point was really fluid and slow. I have a lot yet to study and add to my work, but I feel I’m on my right path

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
I live in São Paulo now, and the city is filled with free or accessible exhibitions. Most of the weekends we have free concerts in cultural centers so I’d probably take my friends to one of them. To eat, I’d probably take to some regional food restaurant.. Experiences that I knew it would only have here.

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
To my mom, to my friends and the female artists community, we got each other;

Website: https://www.brunaiif.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/brunaiif/

Image Credits
Lucas Albin (bio photo)

Nominate Someone: ShoutoutColorado is built on recommendations and shoutouts from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you or someone you know deserves recognition please let us know here.