The Last Brushstroke of a Marathon

I just put the brush down, the last stroke of what feels like a marathon. Twenty-four portraits, all the same size, all carrying a reason, a tribute, a story. People I didn’t know, but people who shaped the world in their own way, and over these months I tried to understand how to translate something of who they were into a single face. For the past weeks I kept repeating to myself that I just wanted to finish this series, not because I stopped loving it, but because taking something to its limit is exhausting, there is a moment when passion becomes weight.

I worked during the day and painted at night, and even when I wasn’t painting my mind never really left the project. It was always there, waiting. When we started, I couldn’t fully understand what this would become, it grew slowly, meeting after meeting, and at the end of each one the project became bigger, not only in the number of portraits but in its meaning. They are people I always saw from a distance, at the front line of culture in Portugal, people I never imagined working with, and their belief felt like a door opening but also like something I had to live up to.

And still, when I paint, none of that exists. There are no thoughts, no expectations, no fear, just me, the canvas and music. The questions only come before and after, when I enter the room or when I step back from a portrait and ask myself if I am really doing this. Some portraits were harder than others, sometimes because there were no good references, sometimes because the person felt distant, and I kept asking myself how to bring something of who they were into a painting that still had to belong to a larger whole.

This project made sense to me, it connects with where I come from and what I have seen growing up, maybe that is why I felt so involved with it. But it came with a cost. Sleep, time with Tarla, moments with family, my own space. I turned something I love into a second job, and there were nights I painted tired, almost sick, not because I had to but because I couldn’t stop, because I wanted to do it well, because I care.

At the same time, every day I stood in that room surrounded by the paintings and saw everything that was wrong, every detail I would change, every brushstroke I would redo. Perfection becomes impossible under pressure, and at some point I had to accept that the only way forward was simple, one portrait at a time. I learned a lot, about the people I painted, about repetition, about control, and also about letting go of control.

These are small portraits, much smaller than what I usually paint, and I had to adapt, fewer brushes, more precision, but still I refused to chase realism. I am not interested in copying a photograph, I am searching for something else, error, texture, movement, something human. The idea behind all of this was simple, created by humans for humans, and I believe that more now than when we started.

Tonight, when I finished the last one, I almost cried. It wasn’t just relief or pride, it was something else. For the first time I felt empty, not in a bad way, just a strange silence, there was no next painting waiting, nothing left to complete, and at the same time there was joy, I did it. I stepped outside to the balcony to feel the air, put my headphones on and listened to piano just to step away from it, and the silence felt peaceful.

Even now, I look at the paintings and I ask myself if this is the best I can do. If the answer is yes, I hope people can see the work and the months behind it, and if the answer is no, I have to accept it and trust that I am still evolving, that perfection is not the goal, that sometimes perfection is also about losing control. There is also fear, the fear of not meeting expectations, of not being seen, of everything fading too quickly, but even if that happens I hope this is a beginning, something that starts from Gus Romano.

Twenty-four portraits, twenty-four times asking the same question, is this done, is this enough. It is not an easy question to live with. Now it is over, and the first thing I did was write this. I don’t want to think about what comes next, not yet. For now I just want to rest, step away, and feel for a moment that there is nothing left to finish.