The grandson of four Jewish immigrants, Anthony Rudolf is one of the leading British poets, critics and translators of his generation. He was the companion and main male model of the painter Paula Rego from 1996 until her death in 2022. Rego, a Portuguese artist who settled in London in the 1950s, was one of the greatest artists of the last 50 years, best known for her dark, powerful paintings and prints based on fairy tales, folk stories and women’s struggles.
This memoir is a deeply moving account of their life together and the intimate relationship between a famous female artist and her male model. Rego once told The Times, ‘He’s wonderful to draw; he loves it, he understands it, he takes part in it. It’s extraordinary – I can’t explain what it is, it’s very, very personal.’
Born in Lisbon in 1935, Paula grew up in the shadow of Salazar’s dictatorship. She was once asked, “Why do you paint?” She replied, “To give fear a face”. She was later sent to school in England and then studied at the Slade in the early 1950s, where she met her husband Victor Willing.
Paula met Tony Rudolf in 1996. She was 60, he was 54. He became her male model a few months later. He describes her studio: “mannequins, costumes and masks... The studio feels like a grand opera backstage, with pictures as operas and models as singers.”
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