Vasco Águas was born in Lagos, South of Portugal, but moved to Lisbon 27 years ago to study architecture; in the meantime, worked in interior design, as a producer, and created scenarios for cinema and television. He is fascinated by haberdasheries, hardware, and DIY stores. As a child, one of his most distant memories is spending hours watching his grandfather Águas fusing lead sheets and turning them into sinkers he used later for fishing. Or to be fascinated by the drawings that grandmother Cecília made to later transform into incredible embroidery. Like these ones, there are other memories and stories of this paternal grandfather and this maternal grandmother, whose abilities soon made him awaken to the most diverse crafts and to the need to keep them alive.
Vasco Águas started — professionally — his textile art project in 2016 with the collaboration of André Matos, having since then developed medium and large-scale tapestries, in which he merges the techniques of macrame and manual weaving, essentially for private collections and public spaces such as hotels and restaurants. In addition to many anonymous artists and artisans that he follows and admires, he highlights the artists Sheila Hicks, Anni Albers, Ann Hamilton, and Beatriz González as main inspirations.
Images courtesy of: André Matos & Francisco Nogueira
