Ana Margarida Costa
- Anna Lilli Garai
- Jan 27
- 2 min read
Ana Margarida Costa is a visual artist based in Lisbon. She works with painting, drawing, photography, and video. Her work often starts from her own story, from family memories to the way childhood fears and expectations stay with you later in life. Some projects look at memory loss, including a series about Alzheimer’s, while others return to early fantasies, like ballet and fairy-tale worlds. Across these different works, she keeps coming back to where she comes from and how thosse experiences still part of who she is today.
Q: What makes you return so often to the origins of your identity in your work?
A: My need for self-discovery, and the fact that to evolve I must understand myself first.
Q: What drew you to explore generational fears and expectations in “Inheritance of Shadow”?
A: The way I was molded to think, and how others around me believed I should do things.
Q: How did working on your Alzheimer’s series change the way you think about memory and identity?
A: It made me realise we can be dead even while we’re alive, and how our physical body becomes far less important than our mind.
Q: When revisiting the world of Swan Lake, what feels different when you translate those childhood impressions now?
A: Nothing feels different — I try to keep the fantasy as alive as possible. Of course the loss of innocence shows that some things aren’t real, but it brings me comfort.
Q: You once wrote directly on your paintings to challenge how viewers approach art. What kind of reaction were you hoping for?
A: I was expecting silence — a moment of reflection, where they realise they don’t need to understand something to like it. Sometimes you just feel it, and that reveals their ability to process sensibility with the world.
Q: What are you working on in the studio right now?
A: I am currently working on my latest collection, “The Inheritance of Shadow”, which I hope to present in an exhibition in 2026.
