INTERVIEW WITH PAULO CUNHA   Otherwise known as *PauloCunha


Paulo has brought many gifts to DA!  He immediately became one of the favorite surrealists, wowing us with his incredible ballpoint pen drawings!  What can be more unforgiving a medium as ballpoint pen?  And he has a quick wit as well!  We are pleased to have an interview with Paulo!




Sorry, I don't give interviews....haha....kidding...here goes...

Mostly, I prefer black ballpoint pens because of the high definition I can get in details and the subtle variations in values in the shading. I use an HB pencil to work out the drawing as I go along and flesh it out with a ballpoint pen, alternating back and forth and errasing the pencil as I go along. I find that with pencil only I have to be extra carefull because it smudges easily and is not conducive with my undisciplined style. However, I had never used a mechanical pencil until a few months ago and I've gotten quite comfortable with it although my precioussss ballpoint is still my favourite. I recently bought some coloured ballpoint pens and I've been having fun with them so don't be surprised if you see a coloured drawing posted in the near future.

Hmmm..my first memory? I don't remember..haha.. I guess it would be when I was at most 3 years old because that was my age when my father came to Canada from my homeland, Portugal, and I didn't see him again until I was 6 when my mother and I joined him here in Canada. I remember that we had a large flock of sheep and my father put me on the back of a ram, there are a few other memories of me and my father in portugal but riding on the back of a ram is probably the earliest.

My first drawings were done on paper used to wrap dead flesh....hahaha... I was 4 or 5 years old and every sunday we would go to church which being a few hundred years old had these amazing frescos painted on the ceiling and I remember staring up at them in awe. Afterwards we would gather at my grandfather's butchershop and while my mother helped my grandfather around the shop I would sit on the counter and draw on the paper used to wrap the meat.

I never really had a favourite toy, in fact, I had very few toys. I had a very rich imagination, and still do, so anything I got my hands on was a toy. I find that today there are way too many toys out there that leave little to the imagination.

As a child my main focus in school was playing with my friends. I grew up on a tobacco farm and coming from a culture where children started working in the fields at a young age, school was an escape from work and an opportunity to socialize with kids my own age. Of course art was my favourite subject but overall I enjoyed learning and I was an honours student until I hit adolescence.

My mother was fairly creative, she loved to knit and crochet and made some beautifull tableclothes and quilts.

It was the summer of '68 and I had just arrived in canada and was playing by myself near an irrigation pond. I had one of those blow up beachballs and when it fell into the pond I climbed down the bank and when I tried to reach the beachball I fell in. Not knowing how to swim, I started sinking. I still remember it vividly, everything was a mirky grey and bubbles were rising upwards all around me. I don't remember feeling any fear or panic and after awhile I was just floating peacefully as if in a comforting warm embrace. I remember seeing a very bright white light above me which started out small but slowly grew larger as I stretched my hand out towards it. I don't remember how long this lasted as there was no sense of time. Then the next thing I remember I was laying on the ground coughing up water as a strange man knelt beside me. I found out later that I had been in the water for at least 15 minutes if not longer. Since then with a slight change in focus I've been able to see auras around everything. I've had many strange things happen throughout my life but I'll save those for my book..hahaha...

Ah, dreams....If only I could remember them... I do remember some pretty strange ones, I especially love the ones where I realize that I am dreaming. Just last month had a dream where I remember realizing that I was dreaming and thinking 'cool I'm dreaming! I can do anything I want!', unfortunately I don't remember the rest of it.

I was about 15 when surrealism first captured my imagination. A friend had brought to school a book on the art of Patrick Woodroffe called Mythopoeikon, I've been hooked ever since.

Why do I relate to surrealism?....hmmm..I don't know really, maybe because it best expresses my warped imagination..hahaha...

My influences in art are Patrick woodroffe of course, Salvador Dali, and many of the early Heavy Metal magazine artists such as Moebius and Richard Corben. In highschool my art teacher Ross Bateman played a major role in kindling my passion for art. He was exceptionally talented and in my opinion, everybit as talented as his famous younger brother Robert Bateman who is a world renowned canadian wildlife artist/naturalist.

I'm inspired to create art by 'Life'.

I guess the most surprising truth that I've discovered is that everthing and everyone is interconnected and part of a single whole. Unfortunately most of us are unaware of this and that what we do to others and our environment we are doing to ourselves.

What is a psychic experience? I have the usual experiences such as knowing who's on the phone before I pick it up or anticepating what someone will say even though it is a different topic from what we are discussing...stuff like that.

Holy crap that took a long time to write.

~Paulo


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