Welcome to my art home

Christ, the redeemer surounded by blue clouds

Hello, my dear art friends,

Welcome to my art blog. My name is Fabio Sombra and I am a Brazilian artist. I started painting in 1990 and during the last 26 years I produced hundreds of landscapes and scenes of Rio de Janeiro - the city in which I was born and still live - as well as other remarkable places. 

As the majority of the so called Naive artists, I am self taught and developed my personal style along the years. My paintings can be found in several private collections around the world as well as in many art museums, such as the Musée International d'art naif Anatole Jakovsky in Nice, France, the International Museum of Naive Art Charlotte Zander in Bonnigheim, Germany, the MIAN - International Museum of Naive Art in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil and the National Museum of Fine Arts in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. 

Since 2004 I became also an author and illustrator of books for children and young adults. I had 42 books published, many of them illustrated with my works. However, I never stopped to paint my city and my country with the colorful images I share here with you. 

Welcome to my art home. Take a seat and enjoy the paintings with a hot cup of Brazilian coffee!

Visiting Fabio Sombra's art studio in Rio de Janeiro

A fresh new landscape just about to find its home in the USA

Working in a landscape comission to a Dutch collector

If you are coming to Rio de Janeiro and have some free time, why don't you come to visit my studio? 

A scheduled visit to my art place in Urca, nearby the Sugar Loaf hill is a pleasant break in a tour along Rio de Janeiro. There you will not only see me at work, painting or hand printing my serighraphs, but also enjoy a lively conversation with and artist who was listed in 2003 by the Brittish magazine Condé Nast Traveller as One of the 50 worldwide travel experts every traveller should meet.

In the studio, you will also find my postcards, art books, posters, original prints and paintings for sale. Please contact me previously by email: fa.sombra@gmail.com

I speak fluent Portuguese, English, Spanish and Italian.

Michael Palin's visit to my studio

Sombra and Palin in Rio

One of the many visitors to Fabio's studio, the Brittish actor and BBC television presenter Michael Palin wrote in his book Brazil:

"Fabio Sombra shows me his latest painting, lovely bright evocations of the good life of Rio. The only thing I'd quibble about is that in Fabio's paintings the sun is always shining. Tonight, as we look out from the balcony nursing jabuticaba caipirinhas, a thick, gray drizzle is falling all around us and the Cidade Maravilhosa is like Rotherham in November." (page 210)

Palin also wrote, in the same book (page:

 "Fabio Sombra is a man who lives, breathes and encapsulates Rio de Janeiro. He is a writer, artist, magician, musician and gourmet. A day in Fabio's company is a day spent on a very individual view of the city he loves." (page 206)  

One of the best travel books about Brazil

Watch the VIDEO below. A tour in Rio de Janeiro through my paintings!

Video. Click to watch:

Rio de Janeiro in a way you've never imagined. This is how I see "the Marvellous City".

Watch the VIDEO below. A tour with my paintings of Paraty, a Brazilian colonial town

Click in the video below to know Paraty with my paintings and my music.

Nice recommendation!

"If you want to capture the colours of Brazil, the richness of its traditions and 21st-century passions and, above all, its sense of fun, there is no better place to look than the work of Fábio Sombra, painter, writer and musician. Let him and his images guide you!"

Ben Box, editor of the South American Handbook (Footprint editions, UK)
 

A lovely reccommendation of my work coming from one of the most qualified experts in travelling in South America: Ben Box, the editor of the legendary South American Handbook.

Ben Box was born in Bristol, England. He attended university in Southampton (BA in Spanish) and London (PhD in the Arthurian Legends in Spain and Portugal). His first job was in Grant and Cutler, a modern languages bookshop in London, after which he worked as a publisher's representative in Southern England. In 1980 he started to work as a freelance writer, specializing in all things Iberian and Latin American. Among his first assignments was sub-editing work on Footprints' legendary South American Handbook -- and this book soon dominated all other projects. He has contributed to newspapers, journals and learned tomes -- usually on the subject of travel, but also on South American literature. Since 1989 he has been involved with many Footprint's projects, all to do with Latin America and the Caribbean. His outside interests and activities include village cricket and gardening.

Visitors from Toronto, Canada.

Slowly, a visit to my art studio in Rio de Janeiro is becoming an interesting attraction for art lovers from all over the world. Today I had a lovely couple from Toronto, Canada  for a nice conversation as I finished my most recent work. It is the best way of knowing an artist and watching his real enviroment. Great morning!