You will not find the work of Henrique Hermes in any gallery. You will not be able to have a glass or ten of Aperol Spritz and converse eloquently with other art lovers about the depth of his work while the gallerist fills up their pockets with half the money. When asked on his Instagram for prints, he would reply: “No prints, but if I was you I would just screenshot what you like and print it yourself, maybe even forge a signature and sell it to Sotheby’s”. You can however buy an original by sliding into his DM’s on Instagram.

Bondoso Bandido, which is his name there, translates to something like “kind bandit” or “nice thug”, which is quite fitting, as most of his work is based on extensive research of imagery or words, from cookbooks, cartoons and newspaper articles. After studying fine art and working in “lots of different shitty jobs”, Henriques made the step towards, what many artists would call, independence and doing nothing else than painting every day. Mostly employing his airbrush, “a 15th-century device to project images”, big brushes and a small scope of acrylic colours, mostly straight out of the can. We spent a day with him in his studio in Caldas da Rainha, not far away from the Portuguese capital, to learn more about how to ‘steal’ in a kind and stylish way. Many cigarettes were inhaled, paint was applied to canvases and quite a few passersby stopped by his studio window which made this day particularly interesting as we were presented with the many facets of Henriques Hermes, the kind bandit.