“Young and talented artist of Portuguese origins, Ana Pinho Vargas grows up breathing art with her parents and brother being musicians, and decides at a young age to dedicate herself to the study of the arts, later approaching the photographic medium, with uniquely personal results and of great visual and emotional impact. Her artworks know how to envelop us in a contemplative warmth, her subjects of a silent nature and nostalgic colors are captured with a melancholic gaze that is able to convey the fascination of a past time. Pages of diaries, details of musical scores, old books… everything reminds of a remote time, alive in the memory, creating in us the curiosity to know what is hidden behind those pages worn out by time, pages that hold precious memories or intimate recollections. The artist gives us an ascetic dimension and she`s able to capture the intimate richness of their essence. It`s an expressive language that opens up our perceptive channels through subjective intimacies, and tells of an aleatory dimension that smells of waiting and silence, where to freely abandon yourself. Each shot combines poetry and emotion, becoming nostalgic narration: the images are presented silently for our sight, spaceless and timeless, inclined towards the research of an absolute simplicity. Atmosphere of silence and contemplation where the objects and details are retrieved from the hidden corners of the memory.”
Text by Monica Ferrarini for the International Contemporary Art catalogue Artisti di Oggi e di Domani 5, Artists of Today and Tomorrow curated by Monica Ferrarini with the collaboration of Alice Di Piero, Gangemi Editor International, December 2024
“Ana Pinho Vargas is a painter, photographer and eclectic artist who has always breathed the scent of art in her family. She loves working in series, symbolically telling the infinite connections that are created and imagined between different disciplines, but at the same time united by emotions, such as music, painting, photography in a dynamic synthesis of images and ideas.”
MIIT Museum page about “Imagination of Masters” exhibition at MIIT Museum in Turin, September 2025
“Ana’s work is a unique fusion of the auditory and the visual, where she meticulously explores the presence of music in her photographs. One of her hallmark pieces, “Silêncio II,” is emblematic of her distinctive style. This work is based on an archive of musical compositions by her father, transformed into photographic art. However, it is not merely about capturing the physical appearance of the musical sheets; instead, Ana uses them as a bridge to deeper metaphors. The images she creates do not produce sound, yet the presence of music is undeniably felt. This subtle yet powerful representation of sound through visual means has become a defining theme in her portfolio.”
Article “Ana Pinho Vargas: The Harmony of Art and Music” on AATONAU, contemporary art blog, written by Bianca Kann, November 2024
“Photography captures moments, but it also evokes atmospheres and memories. "Silêncio", the exhibition by Ana Pinho Vargas, invites us to dive into the stillness of the images and find meaning in the space between the words. A visual and sensory experience not to be missed.”
Oliva Creative Factory page about “Silêncio” exhibition at the Photography Gallery of the São João da Madeira Art Center, February 2025
“Ana Pinho Vargas is a Portuguese photographer and painter. Her work is a unique fusion of the auditory and the visual, where she meticulously explores the presence of music in her photographs. The concept of “sound in an image” is central to Ana`s artistic philosophy.”
Article on Artist Close Up Contemporary Art Magazine Issue 25, December 2024
Ana Pinho Vargas is a Portuguese artist, photographer and painter, currently living and working in Vila Nova de Gaia, Porto.
She has exhibited her work nationally - Lisbon, Porto, São João da Madeira - and internationally - Barcelona, Trieste, Buenos Aires, Venice, Rome, Turin. Ana Pinho Vargas will also participate in the XV Florence Biennale in October this year.
She won the International Award “Artist of the Year 2025 Prize” by Effetto Arte Fondazione and curators Salvatore Russo and Francesco Saverio Russo in January of 2025. She also won the International Prize “Leonardo da Vinci - The Universal Artist” by Effetto Arte Fondazione, curated by Salvatore Russo and Francesco Saverio Russo in June of 2025.
Her artistic practice involves music, photography and abstraction. She thinks about the image musically, trying to create times, rhythms, and harmonies from it. The search for different melodic forms acts as a means of abstract self-representation, where she records her own reality.