Lucas Arruda was born in São Paulo, Brazil in 1980. He creates subtly eerie, imagined, and impressionistic depictions of landscapes: flatlands, water, and skies minimally interrupted by low rocks and forested islands. Many pictures suggest beaches at low tide on foggy mornings or twilight that seem to follow the styles of James McNeill Whistler, Casper David Friedrich, and Edward Hopper. Arruda is an Impressionistic wanderer, peering from the outer fringe into the unknown civilization and perhaps, even, the unknown cosmos.

In fact, he is genuinely interested with the use and evocative possibilities of paint smeared on fabric to explore and create colorful illusions. To Arruda, the landscape is merely the means to an end for deep meditations on memory and loss, using history or abstraction as the starting point. His works strike a pleasing yet existential nerve that has a universal quality that asks to be felt, not just understood, which he understands as an essential component of art: “Painting for me is like having a candle in the dark that allows you to see only what is close to you.”

Arruda has participated in numerous international exhibitions including Ill Mostra de Programa de Exposiçoes 2014, Centro Cultural São Paulo, Brazil, La Bienal 2013: Here is Where We Jump, Museo del Bario, New York, USA, and is in permanent collections of the J. Paul Getty Collection, Los Angeles, USA and Pinacoteca do Estado de São Paulo, Brazil.

Lucas Arruda currently lives and works in São Paulo, Brazil.