Hildebrando de Melo

Hildebrando de Melo (born 1978) is an Angolan visual artist. De Melo grew up in Portugal where he lived with his grandmother, converted to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and where he began art. He returned to Angola and pursued his art career. Throughout his career, he has displayed his artwork in multiple exhibits around the world. He has won awards for his art. He is largely self-taught and some of his artwork is politically motivated and includes paintings, drawings, sculptures and multi-media. His art is also personal to his life, with his experiences being the subject matter of many of his art pieces.

Early education Hildebrando de Melo was born in Bailundo, Angola, and spent his early childhood in Lobito. After his grandmother's death, de Melo's aunt and uncle moved to a small town and sent him to work in a factory. When he was 11 or 12, an art teacher gave him advanced lessons in painting and taught him about modern art. It was not until he turned 18 in 1996, that de Melo returned to his birth family in Angola, some of which he had not yet met. Angola was also different from what de Melo remembered: due to their civil war that began three years before de Melo was born and would not end until 2002, the country was in constant flux. However, de Melo was celebrated for having returned to Angola at such a turbulent time when he had the option to remain in Europe. De Melo decided in his early 20s that he wanted to become a professional artist. He initially received some pushback from his father who hoped Hildebrando would choose a different career, but that would change and Hildebrando would receive his father’s support.

De Melo works primarily in series or intense bursts of activity; during these bursts, he will typically produce about two dozen works based on a shared theme. From February 16 to March 6, 2016, de Melo exhibited Expand at That Art Fair, sponsored by ArtAfrica magazine in Cape Town, South Africa. Also in 2016, de Melo exhibited sixteen sculptures at the Camões-Portuguese Cultural Center in Luanda from November 24 to December 15. He participated in Jaipur Kala Chaupal artistic residence and festival. From December 2018 to January 2019, de Melo exhibited artwork at the Espaço Mude in Portugal. His Apropriação (Appropriation) exhibited at Lab Art & Co, a modern art gallery in Angola, from January 2018 to March 2019.

The Mormon Arts Center produced an exhibit of de Melo's work entitled Nzambi (God), which was curated by Glen Nelson. After exhibiting at the Mormon Arts festival, Nzambi was exhibited in the Harold B. Lee Library at Brigham Young University. Because of the difficulty in moving artwork from Angola, de Melo painted the works in the exhibit while he was visiting New York during a residency program. He also was awarded the "Sona Desenhos na Sand" award from the Norwegian company Norsk Hidro.