“She passed away peacefully this morning, after a short illness, at her home in North London, surrounded by her family. Our deepest thoughts are with them.”

A visitor looks at ‘The Betrothal: Lessons: The Shipwreck, after ‘Marriage a la Mode’ by Hogarth’ by Paula Rego at Tate Britain. Credit: Rick Findler/Shutterstock

She then studied painting at the Slade School of Fine Art in London in the 1950s, where she met another painting student, Victor Willing, whom she married. The family traveled between the two countries and settled in London in 1972, where they lived and worked until their death.

In 2009, the Casa Das Histórias Paula Rego, a museum dedicated to her work, opened in the seaside town of Cascais, just outside Lisbon.

And a year later, she was made a Dame of the British Empire for her services to the arts.

The largest and most comprehensive retrospective of his work to date opened last year at Tate Britain, traveling to Kunstmuseum Den Haag in the Netherlands and Museo Picasso Málaga, Spain.

According to the Tate website, “the exhibition tells the story of this artist’s remarkable life, highlighting the personal nature of much of her work and the socio-political context in which it is rooted.”

It presents more than 100 works including collages, paintings, large-format pastels, drawings and engravings, from the 1950s to the 2000s.

Tate Britain held the largest-ever retrospective of Rego’s work in 2021. Credit: Tim P. Whitby/Getty Images

“It’s an honor to have been a small part of his work and to have him as such a big part of my life.

“It’s a sad day for many.”