Emanuel Santos

Emanuel Jorge da Silva Santos (born 20 November 1976) is a Portuguese artist from Madeira, Portugal. In 2017, he became famous for a sculpture of Madeiran native footballer Cristiano Ronaldo which was widely derided by media outlets. The English newspaper The Guardian commented “suddenly, this sculptor was the most famous artist in the world”.

Personal life Santos is married and has one son. He lives in Caniçal, the principal cargo port of Madeira and works part-time at Cristiano Ronaldo International Airport. In 2017, Santos became leader of Caniçal Parish Council, when his centre-left PS party won the local election.

Works Santos makes sculptures and paintings in acrylic on canvas. His works are installed several public locations on Madeira.

Busts of Cristiano Ronaldo Santos has created two busts of Cristiano Ronaldo. The renaming ceremony was attended by Ronaldo, President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, and Prime Minister António Costa, among other guests and hundreds of fans. The sculpture received a strong reaction from news outlets and on social media following its unveiling, with most commenting on the work's lack of resemblance to Ronaldo, and was intended to be on permanent display outside the airport's terminal entrance. In 2018, Bleacher Report commissioned Santos to create a second bust of Ronaldo. The original sculpture was to continue to be displayed at the airport.

Writing in The Guardian, the art critic Eddy Frankel compared the public reaction to the first Ronaldo bust to the imposition of socialist realism (the official art of the Soviet Union), but with the rules enforced by the public.

Original bust Description and history The bust was unveiled at Cristiano Ronaldo International Airport's (pictured in 2015) terminal entrance in 2017.

The original bust was said by Santos to take between two and three weeks to complete, and was "not as simple as it seems" to create. He based his work on photographs of Ronaldo, who was unavailable to model in person. According to Santos, Ronaldo saw pictures of the proposed bust and only requested small adjustments to make his appearance more youthful. Santos recalled: He only asked for some wrinkles that gave him a certain expression in his face when he's about to laugh to be changed... He said it made him look older and asked for it to be thinned out a bit to make it smoother and more jovial. But they gave it the go-ahead and they liked what they saw. as part of an official ceremony to rename Maderia Airport to Cristiano Ronaldo International Airport. The reportedly "bizarre" and "eccentric" event was also attended by the nation's president, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, and prime minister, António Costa, who unveiled a commemorative plaque together, as well as dozens of other guests and hundreds of fans. It was intended to remain on permanent display outside the airport's terminal entrance. Headlines described the sculpture as "bizarre", "creepy", "hideous", "horrifying", "mangled", "odd-looking", and "questionable". Some people used the hashtag "RonaldoBust" to share manipulated photos, or suggested conspiracy theories based on Ronaldo's football rivalries. Furthermore, he questioned how the "bronze abomination [could] become a reality" and said the sculpture "looks as if Ronaldo had slammed his face into the ground multiple times". Finally, Ng quipped, "Here's hoping the replacement bust of Ronaldo won't be as terrifying as the original."

The Daily Telegraph Sean Gibson suggested that Ronaldo, "who prides himself so much on his winsome complexion cannot be best pleased with this particular artist's impression of him", but noted that he and his fans seemed pleased at the ceremony.

The Mercury News said Ronaldo was "upstaged" by his own bust, which "hardly does the handsome footballer justice". Joe Prince-Wright of NBC Sports called the work "horrendous". Victor Mather of The New York Times described the sculpture's "goofy smirk and uneven eyes", suggested it resembled Latvian basketball player Kristaps Porziņģis, and wrote, "Most art connoisseurs out there were not impressed".

The sculpture was said to resemble Irish former professional footballer and businessman Niall Quinn (pictured in 2014), among many other comparisons.

Claire McCartney of the magazine Paper wrote, "despite Ronaldo's world-renowned beauty and famously symmetrical face, the statue Portugal created of him was...questionable. I mean, truly, the stuff of nightmares. Perhaps the sculptor was drunk, or high, or even a little bit jealous and decided to mold Ronaldo's face into swirly obscurity. No matter the reason, the result is horrifying." Raisa Bruner of Time magazine said the sculpture is "bizarre", "questionable", and generated "plenty of jokes, memes, and head-shaking".

Rich McCormick of The Verge wrote, "The finished product makes the famously handsome man into something of a monster, squaring his head, shrinking his eyes, and inflating his bones to horrific levels. It looks like someone having a bad reaction to hair dye, or like The Goonies Sloth after some partially successful plastic surgery, and as is to be expected in these situations, the internet went wild." Santos has said the reception his first bust received had a negative impact on him and his family. He completed work on the sculpture in March. Santos' reaction to seeing the bust for the first time was released by Bleacher Report, on the one year anniversary of the original sculpture's unveiling.

The sports website published a documentary video about Santos, in which he said: "The first Ronaldo bust, if I hadn't done it the way I did, it would've already been forgotten a long time ago. So, sometimes it's necessary to have a certain bravery to go against the usual and have an impact. Because even though there are people who mock and make negative comments, there are still many people who value it. And what I've learned through all this time is that no matter how few people can see the positive side of the work, they are enough to give us strength." Santos also said he remains proud of the original bust.

Diario AS said "the new bust far more loyal to reality", ESPN's Chris Wright wrote, "The second bust is undoubtedly a lot more polished and lifelike, though it also lacks the naive charm of the wonky original." Tom Doyle of London Evening Standard called the bust "brilliant" and "impressive".

Bust of Gareth Bale

In 2017, the Irish bookmaker Paddy Power commissioned Santos to make a bust of Ronaldo's then team-mate, the Welsh footballer Gareth Bale. The bust was unveiled in Cardiff before the 2017 UEFA Champions League Final at the city's Millennium Stadium. The bust was valued at approximately £25,000 and weighs 40 kg.