www.akacorleone.com
Text: Joana Jervell
Photos: Courtesy of AkaCorleone
Living and working in Lisbon, Pedro Campiche is the face behind the AkaCorleone name. Whether working on a large or small scale, carrying out public art projects or exhibiting works in galleries, the visual artist recognizes the constant need to explore new techniques, formats and approaches, in works that are always impactful and to which no one is indifferent.
How did your background and education influence your career as the multifaceted artist you are today?
My background and my first school were graffiti, which will always be an important part of my career and my influences as an artist. I was trained in graphic design, which has given me important foundations, but it turned out to be a different path from the one I wanted to follow.
How have your artistic interests evolved so far?
I feel like my interests are changing all the time… With the amount of information we absorb each day, the references and inspirations are being renewed constantly.
What else do you seek to explore with your creations?
To experiment, to do something new, use different materials, explore a language I don’t know, to step outside my comfort zone.
How do you embrace each new project? Is there a method to your creative process?
I “navigate” between different projects — which can be either an exhibition, a mural, or commercial work. So the approaches can vary depending on the challenge, but they usually start the same way: with a blank page, some notes, research, and trial and error… Then the process can vary, but it always has to go through this initial phase.
How do you normally select the location of your work?
Nowadays it is more common to be challenged to put my works in locations defined by those who contact me, but I always have more personal projects that I define as objectives and, as a rule, I won’t rest until I achieve that objective. These projects come about by chance, I can pass a place that I put on a list, or remember an idea that needs a certain location that I can start looking for…
On what scale do you prefer to work?
It can vary a lot. I feel the same enthusiasm in painting a 5-story building as I do a 1x1m canvas. When it comes to murals, there’s always that challenge of doing something bigger than before, of raising the bar… For gallery works I am also increasingly exploring larger scale works.
How would you like people to see your work?
As an exercise of constant experimentation, because I feel I am still finding my way; I don’t want to have a formula and repeat it until it is exhausted, and I hope that this experience is passed on to the people who view my work.
Your last job was…
Painting an interior wall in an architect’s office.
And what would you like to tell us about your plans for 2020?
2020 will be a year full of new challenges! I have some projects abroad, exhibitions in which I will explore new techniques, and some crazy ideas that I hope to realise, but for now I think it’s better not to say much more…
