MMaxi

The story at the heart of the painting came to Paula Rego ready-made in the form of Jean Genet's play The Maids (1947), itself based on the real-life case of the Papin sisters, Christine and Lea, who worked as maids for a rich Parisian family. One day, frightened for no apparent reason other than that of a power cut which inconvenienced and possibly frightened the sisters, they brutally murdered the mother and daughter of the family while the man of the house was out at work. In working with the story, Paula Rego seems to have focused on the unnatural closeness of the sisters, both to each other and the mother and daughter they murder. Ambiguity and menacing psychosis reverberate within the picture, much of it carried in the objects with which the room is claustrophobically furnished. And isn't there something uncertain about the sexuality of the seated figure?

Paula Rego's Biography and Exhibitions
BIOGRAPHY

1934 Born in Lisbon
1945-51
Educated in St Julian's School, Carcavelos
1952-56 The Slade School of Art, London
1956-63 Lived in Ericeira, Portugal, with her husband, the painter Victor Willing, and three children
1962-63 Bursary from the Gulbenkian Foundation, Lisbon
1976 Settled permanently in London
1983 Visiting Lecturer in Painting Slade School of Art
1990 Appointed the First National Gallery Associate Artist
1992 Honorary Master of Art, Winchester School of Art, 12 June
1999Honorary Doctorate of Letters, University of St. Andrews, Scotland, 24 June
       Honorary Doctorate of Letters, University of East Anglia, Norwich, 8 July

2000 Honorary Doctorate of Letters, Rhode Island School of Design, USA, 3 June
2002 Honorary Doctorate of Letters, The London Institute, 23 May
2004Grã Cruz da Ordem de Sant'Iago da Espada presented by the President of Portugal

2005Commissioned by the Royal Mail to produce a set of Jane Eyre Stamps
Honorary Doctorate of Letters, Oxford University, June
Honorary Doctorate of Letters, Roehampton University, July

Currently lives and works in London

• Places I have been | 05-09-2008
• It's my Birthday | 04-09-2008
• More midnight Sun | 02-09-2008
• Norway Lofoten Islands Summer 08 | 02-09-2008
• MMaxi08 Lofoten Islands | 02-09-2008
• Norway Summer08 | 02-09-2008
• Norway Summer08 | 02-09-2008
• Norway Summer08 | 02-09-2008
• MMaxi08Norway | 01-09-2008
• MMaxi08Norway | 01-09-2008
• MMaxi08Norway | 01-09-2008
• Lofoten Islands Norway | 31-08-2008
• Lofoten Islands Norway summer 08 | 31-08-2008
• Lofoten Islands | 31-08-2008
• MMaxi08 Lofoten Islands | 31-08-2008