Emanuel Santos

Emanuel Jorge da Silva Santos (born 20 November 1976)[1] is an artist from Madeira, Portugal. In 2017 he became famous for a sculpture of the Madeira footballer Cristiano Ronaldo which was widely derided in media articles. The English newspaper The Guardian commented Suddenly, this sculptor was the most famous artist in the world.[2]

Emanuel Santos
Born (1976-11-20) November 20, 1976
NationalityPortugal
Notable work
Sculpture of the Madeira footballer Cristiano Ronaldo
Not to be confused with Emmanuel Santos.

Personal life

Santos is married with one son and lives in Caniçal, the principal cargo port of Madeira. He works part-time at Cristiano Ronaldo International Airport. In 2017, Santos became leader of Caniçal Parish Council, when his centre-left PS party won the local election.[3][4]

Works

Santos makes sculptures and paintings in acrylic on canvas. His works are installed several public locations on Maderia.[1]

In 2016, Santos created a monument to fishermen in the port of Caniçal, Maderia. The life-size sculpture depicts two fishermen in a small boat, and is sited on a roundabout on the seafront.[5]

Santos has created two busts of footballer Cristiano Ronaldo, one in 2017 and another in 2018.[6][7][8][2]

Busts of Cristiano Ronaldo

Santos has created two bronze sculptures depicting Ronaldo. The first was unveiled at the newly renamed Cristiano Ronaldo International Airport on the Portuguese island of Madeira on March 29, 2017.[9] The renaming ceremony was attended by Ronaldo, the nation's president, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, and the prime minister, António Costa, among other guests and hundreds of fans. The sculpture received a strong reaction from news outlets and on social media following its unveiling, with most commenting on the work's lack of resemblance to Ronaldo, and was intended to be on permanent display outside the airport's terminal entrance. In 2018, Bleacher Report commissioned Santos to create a second bust of Ronaldo. The original sculpture was to continue to be displayed at the airport.

Writing in The Guardian, the art critic[10] Eddy Frankel compared the public reaction to the first Ronaldo bust to the imposition of socialist realism (the official art of the Soviet Union), but with the rules enforced by the public.[2] Frankel preferred Santos's first bust, commenting:

The original really is a better sculpture. It’s an ecstatic mess, its face a hybrid of Ronaldo and Santos’s, two sets of features squidged together. It’s the artist seeing something of himself in the rags-to-riches glory of Ronaldo. It’s feverish, intense; the work of someone driven obsessively. The new version is someone forced into a do-over to save face. Whereas the eyes of the original bust seem pointed in a thousand directions – joyful, unfocused and giddy – the eyes of the new one look to a faraway point. They are lost, cold, sullen. This is a dead sculpture, an acceptance of defeat in the face of public outcry. And it will be immediately forgotten.[2]

In June 2018, the first bust was removed from display at the airport and replaced with a bust of Ronaldo by a Spanish sculptor.[11][12][13]

Original bust
Description and history
The bust was unveiled at Cristiano Ronaldo International Airport's (pictured in 2015) terminal entrance in 2017.

The bronze sculpture depicting Portuguese professional footballer Cristiano Ronaldo was sculpted by Santos.[6][7] Santos said the bust took between two and three weeks to complete, and was "not as simple as it seems" to create.[6][7] He based his work on photographs of Ronaldo, who was unavailable to model in person. According to the sculptor, Ronaldo saw pictures of the proposed bust and only requested small adjustments to make his appearance more youthful. Santos recalled:

He only asked for some wrinkles that gave him a certain expression in his face when he's about to laugh to be changed... He said it made him look older and asked for it to be thinned out a bit to make it smoother and more jovial. But they gave it the go-ahead and they liked what they saw.[6][7]

Cristiano Ronaldo (pictured in 2015) attended the unveiling.

The sculpture was unveiled by Ronaldo on March 29, 2017,[14] as part of an official ceremony to rename Maderia Airport to Cristiano Ronaldo International Airport.[15] The reportedly "bizarre" and "eccentric" event was also attended by the nation's president, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, and prime minister, António Costa, who unveiled a commemorative plaque together, as well as dozens of other guests and hundreds of fans.[6][16] It was intended to remain on permanent display outside the airport's terminal entrance.[6]

Reception

The bust received a strong reaction from news outlets and on social media following its unveiling, with commentary focused on the work's lacking resemblance to Ronaldo.[17] Headlines described the sculpture as "bizarre",[6][18] "creepy",[19] "hideous",[20][21][22] "horrifying",[23][24] "mangled",[9] "peculiar",[25] "odd-looking",[15] "scary",[26] and "questionable".[27] Some people used the hashtag "RonaldoBust" to share manipulated photos, or suggested conspiracy theories based on Ronaldo's football rivalries.[17] Ronaldo did not seem bothered by the bust during the unveiling ceremony.[15] Santos has defended his work and said that he, Ronaldo, Ronaldo's mother, and the airport chiefs who commissioned the work were happy with the final product.[6][7] Santos said:

It is impossible to please the Greeks and Trojans. Neither did Jesus please everyone... This is a matter of taste, so it is not as simple as it seems. What matters is the impact that this work generated. There is always the possibility of making a difference, I was prepared for all this.[6][7]

The bust drew comparisons to David Coulthard (left) and John Arne Riise (right).

Alan Dawson of Business Insider said the sculpture looked like a grown-up version of Alfred E. Neuman, the fictitious mascot and cover boy of the American magazine, Mad.[25] CNET's Alfred Ng called the bust "ugly" and made Ronaldo a "laughingstock" of Twitter.[28] Furthermore, he questioned how the "bronze abomination [could] become a reality" and said the sculpture "looks as if Ronaldo had slammed his face into the ground multiple times". Finally, Ng quipped, "Here's hoping the replacement bust of Ronaldo won't be as terrifying as the original."[28] Hayley Jones of The Daily Beast said fans were "thrown for a loop", the sculpture's "vaguely menacing visage now sneers at passersby", and quipped, "Bronzing never ends well for anyone."[29]

The Daily Telegraph's Sean Gibson suggested that Ronaldo, "who prides himself so much on his winsome complexion cannot be best pleased with this particular artist's impression of him", but noted that he and his fans seemed pleased at the ceremony.[24] The Guardian's Elle Hunt said the bust resembles Kryten from the British comedy franchise Red Dwarf, and the botched Ecce Homo restoration.[17] Hindustan Times said the bronze has a "toothy grin and bulging eyes that instantly created a laugh on social media because of its debatable likeness".[20] The Independent described the artwork as "amusing" and "scary", and compared its "disconcertingly lopsided grin" to "The Head" from the British children's television series Art Attack as well as Raoul Moat.[16] Tom Doyle of London Evening Standard called the bust a "bizarre", "troll face" statue that "delighted and horrified Twitter in equal measure".[30]

The Mercury News said Ronaldo was "upstaged" by his own bust, which "hardly does the handsome footballer justice".[15] The newspaper compared the bronze to one of Lucille Ball installed in Celoron, New York, nicknamed Scary Lucy, and furthermore said of Ronaldo's bronze: "It squashes his eyes close together, and the cheeky raised-eyebrow smile more resembles a leer. The face is also unusually chubby, in contrast to Ronaldo's chiseled looks.[15] NPR's Colin Dwyer also compared the bust of Ronaldo to Scary Lucy.[31] Joe Prince-Wright of NBC Sports called the work "horrendous".[18] New York Daily News' Brett Bodner said the bust is "kind of creepy", "looks nothing like Ronaldo", and reported that "the internet could't help but make fun of how bad the statue looks".[32] Victor Mather of The New York Times described the sculpture's "goofy smirk and uneven eyes", suggested it resembled Latvian basketball player Kristaps Porziņģis, and wrote, "Most art connoisseurs out there were not impressed".[33]

The sculpture was said to resemble Irish former professional footballer and businessman Niall Quinn (pictured in 2014), among many other comparisons.

Claire McCartney of the magazine Paper wrote, "despite Ronaldo's world-renowned beauty and famously symmetrical face, the statue Portugal created of him was...questionable. I mean, truly, the stuff of nightmares. Perhaps the sculptor was drunk, or high, or even a little bit jealous and decided to mold Ronaldo's face into swirly obscurity. No matter the reason, the result is horrifying."[23] People magazine's Brianne Tracy said the work "looks nothing like" Ronaldo and used word play to describe the sculpture as "well, a bust".[34] Raisa Bruner of Time magazine said the sculpture is "bizarre", "questionable", and generated "plenty of jokes, memes, and head-shaking".[27] USA Today's Charles Curtis also used a pun to describe the artwork as "a bust".[19] He called the sculpture "pretty creepy" and compared the depiction of Ronaldo to the courtroom sketch of Tom Brady,[19] which received a similar reaction in 2015.[35][36][37]

Rich McCormick of The Verge wrote, "The finished product makes the famously handsome man into something of a monster, squaring his head, shrinking his eyes, and inflating his bones to horrific levels. It looks like someone having a bad reaction to hair dye, or like The Goonies' Sloth after some partially successful plastic surgery, and as is to be expected in these situations, the internet went wild."[9] McCormick also noted the many photoshopped parodies that appeared online, depicting Ronaldo as "Batman's Two-Face, Mass Effect's eerily animated main character, Han Solo frozen in carbonite, BioShock's Andrew Ryan, and as IT, the monster hiding in the sewers. Others went the other way, mapping the unheimlich contours of the bust's face onto the real man's real face, making his head lumpen and his eyes scream 'kill me.'"[9]

The sculpture has also been said to depict Irish former professional footballer and businessman Niall Quinn.[6][7][17]

Second bust
External video
Sculptor of Infamous Cristiano Ronaldo Bust Gets Shot at Redemption on YouTube (29 March 2018), Bleacher Report

In 2018, Bleacher Report commissioned Santos to create a "more traditional interpretation" bust of Ronaldo with a "more serious" demeanor. The original sculpture will continue to be displayed at Cristiano Ronaldo International Airport.[38] Santos has said the reception his first bust received had a negative impact on him and his family.[39][40] He completed work on the sculpture in March. Santos' reaction to seeing the bust for the first time was released by Bleacher Report, on the one year anniversary of the original sculpture's unveiling.[41]

The sports website published a documentary video about Santos,[42] in which he said: "The first Ronaldo bust, if I hadn't done it the way I did, it would've already been forgotten a long time ago. So, sometimes it's necessary to have a certain bravery to go against the usual and have an impact. Because even though there are people who mock and make negative comments, there are still many people who value it. And what I've learned through all this time is that no matter how few people can see the positive side of the work, they are enough to give us strength."[41][43] Santos also said he remains proud of the original bust.[44]

Diario AS said "the new bust far more loyal to reality",[40] and entertainment.ie said "the finished product is altogether more acceptable. We dare say that even the man himself might grudgingly accept the likeness this time."[45] ESPN's Chris Wright wrote, "The second bust is undoubtedly a lot more polished and lifelike, though it also lacks the naive charm of the wonky original."[46] Tom Doyle of London Evening Standard called the bust "brilliant" and "impressive".[39]

Bust of Gareth Bale

In 2017, the Irish bookmaker Paddy Power commissioned Santos to make a bust of Ronaldo's then team-mate, the Welsh footballer Gareth Bale. The bust was unveiled in Cardiff before the 2017 UEFA Champions League Final at the city's Millennium Stadium.[47][48][49] The bust is worth approximately £25,000 and weighs 40kg.[50][47] It was made in Porto, Portugal, and took 264 hours to create.[51]

gollark: Compared to what?
gollark: Maybe Rust with nicer syntax.
gollark: I can extend it into the realm of complex numbers; that'd actually be fun.
gollark: Making infipage 2D?
gollark: Let's write a python interpreter in haskell.

References
  1. "O Candidato – Emanuel Emanuel Jorge da Silva Santos". PS Machico (in Portuguese). Retrieved 11 June 2018.
  2. Frankel, Eddy (3 April 2018). "Now even worse: ridiculed bust of Cristiano Ronaldo gets a dreadful do-over". The Guardian. London. Retrieved 4 April 2018.
  3. Silva, Emanuel (2 October 2017). "Escultor do busto de Ronaldo ganha no Caniçal com maioria absoluta (47,19%)". Funchal Notícias (in Portuguese). Retrieved 9 June 2018.
  4. Caires, Marta (29 September 2017). "O escultor de Cristiano Ronaldo que se candidata pelo PS e os independentes que veneram Jardim". Expresso (in Portuguese). Lisbon. Retrieved 9 June 2018.
  5. Silva, Emanuel (29 March 2017). "O criador e a criatura: O homem do busto é do Caniçal e já homenageou os pescadores". Funchal Notícias (in Portuguese). Retrieved 9 June 2018.
  6. "Ronaldo statue: Sculptor Emanuel Santos defends his bizarre work". BBC News. 30 March 2017. Retrieved 30 March 2017.
  7. "'Neither did Jesus please everyone' – Ronaldo sculptor happy". Raidió Teilifís Éireann. 30 March 2017. Retrieved 31 March 2017.
  8. Naqi, Kelly (29 March 2018). "A Year After Internet Infamy, Ronaldo Sculptor Gets Another Shot". Bleacher Report. Retrieved 4 April 2018.
  9. McCormick, Rich (30 March 2017). "Cristiano Ronaldo's mangled statue sends the internet into Photoshop frenzy". The Verge. Vox Media. Retrieved 30 March 2017.
  10. "Eddy Frankel". The Guardian. Retrieved 17 June 2018. Eddy Frankel is visual art editor of Time Out and the founder of Oof, a magazine about art and football.
  11. "Emanuel Santos está triste com substituição do busto". Diário de Notícias (in Portuguese). Funchal. 17 June 2018. Retrieved 17 June 2018.
  12. "Aeroporto da Madeira tem novo busto de Cristiano Ronaldo". Diário de Notícias (in Portuguese). Funchal. 17 June 2018. Retrieved 17 June 2018.
  13. "Cristiano Ronaldo: Mocked statue at Madeira airport is replaced". BBC Sport. 18 June 2018. Retrieved 23 May 2019.
  14. Paiella, Gabriella (29 March 2017). "You Can Barely Tell the Difference Between Cristiano Ronaldo and His New Bronze Statue". New York. New York City: New York Media, LLC. ISSN 0028-7369. Retrieved 30 March 2017.
  15. "Odd-looking Cristiano Ronaldo statue: Is it the new Scary Lucy?". The Mercury News. 29 March 2017. Retrieved 30 March 2017.
  16. "7 important questions we have about the Cristiano Ronaldo statue at Madeira airport". The Independent. 30 March 2017. Retrieved 30 March 2017.
  17. Hunt, Elle (29 March 2017). "Ronaldo or bust: social media gives statue of footballer a black eye". The Guardian. London: Guardian Media Group. ISSN 0261-3077. OCLC 60623878. Retrieved 30 March 2017.
  18. Prince-Wright, Joe. "Photos: Bizarre Cristiano Ronaldo Statue Unveiled". NBC Sports. Retrieved 31 March 2017.
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  26. Fisher, Kendall (29 March 2017). "Cristiano Ronaldo's Bronze Bust Is a...Bust: See Pics of the Soccer Stud's Scary New Statue". E! Online. NBCUniversal. Retrieved 1 April 2017.
  27. Bruner, Raisa (29 March 2017). "The Internet Has Jokes About Cristiano Ronaldo's Questionable New Bronze Statue". Time. Time Inc. ISSN 0040-781X. OCLC 1311479. Retrieved 31 March 2017.
  28. Ng, Alfred (29 March 2017). "Cristiano Ronaldo statue was built of nightmares and bronze". CNET. Retrieved 31 March 2017.
  29. Jones, Hayley (29 March 2017). "Cristiano Ronaldo's Statue Will Give You Nightmares". The Daily Beast. IAC. Retrieved 31 March 2017.
  30. Doyle, Tom (29 March 2017). "Cristiano Ronaldo unveils bizarre 'troll face' statue as Madeira Airport is renamed after Real Madrid star". London Evening Standard. Retrieved 31 March 2017.
  31. Dwyer, Colin. "Cristiano Ronaldo's New Bronze Bust Is Turning Heads". NPR. Retrieved 31 March 2017.
  32. Bodner, Brett (29 March 2017). "SEE IT: Portugal airport honors Cristiano Ronaldo with hideous bust that looks nothing like him". New York Daily News. OCLC 9541172. Retrieved 1 April 2017.
  33. Mather, Victor (March 29, 2017). "Ronaldo Bust Looks Nothing Like Ronaldo, and the Internet Notices". The New York Times. The New York Times Company. ISSN 0362-4331. OCLC 1645522. Retrieved June 22, 2017.
  34. Tracy, Brianne (29 March 2017). "Cristiano Ronaldo's Latest Statue Looks Nothing Like Him — and the Internet Is Cracking Up About It". People. Time Inc. ISSN 0093-7673. Retrieved 31 March 2017.
  35. Feeney, Nolan (31 August 2015). "Viral Tom Brady Sketch Artist Gets Another Shot at Court Drawing". Time. Retrieved 31 March 2017.
  36. Schwartz, Nick (12 August 2015). "The 10 funniest Tom Brady courtroom sketch memes". USA Today. Retrieved 31 March 2017.
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  39. Doyle, Tom (29 March 2018). "Cristiano Ronaldo gets a makeover! Portuguese sculptor unveils brilliant new bust one year after airport statue". London Evening Standard. Retrieved 30 March 2018.
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  46. Wright, Chris (29 March 2018). "Cristiano Ronaldo sculptor takes second shot at bust after first went viral". ESPN. Retrieved 30 March 2018.
  47. Gibson, Sean (31 May 2017). "Infamous Ronaldo sculptor tries to make amends with new 'likeness' of Gareth Bale". The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 22 June 2017.
  48. "Paddy Power tempts Cristiano Ronaldo bust sculptor out of retirement with Gareth Bale project". The Drum. Retrieved 2019-09-27.
  49. "PADDY POWER AND WELCOME TO BALES - Ready 10". ready10.media. Retrieved 2019-09-27.
  50. https://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/40119882
  51. https://bleacherreport.com/articles/2712718-cristiano-ronaldo-statue-sculptor-reveals-new-gareth-bale-bust
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