Joao Moraes de Abreu was born in 1951 in Terezina, capital of Piaui, Brazil into a merchant and housewife family. He has been painting and making wooden sculptures (mainly car models) since he was 10 years old, and at the age of 15 he already had customers from the USA for car models made of burita, a type of light palm wood. A mechanical design graduate, João is a self-taught artist. His main profession is a designer in an advertising agency. The first solo exhibition was in his hometown in 1976, and since then he has had over 50 individual and group participations. His works are in a number of prestigious collections such as the Vatican and Princess Grace Kelly in Monaco. He lives in his hometown and has his own gallery-studio.
