Career
He was also a writer and a teacher. He moved to Rio de Janeiro in 1854, where he was granted a scholarship to study in the Academia Imperial de Belas Artes (Imperial Academy of Fine Arts). Returning to Brazil, he produced one of the most well known works of art in Brazil: Independence or Death!, depicting the moment when Prince Peter declared the country independent from Portugal, a work that has illustrated History books for elementary schools in Brazil for decades.
Living mostly in Florence, Italy but traveling extensively back and forth from Rio de Janeiro, Pedro Américo managed to work also as a lecturer and an art historian.
With the proclamation of the Republic in Brazil in 1889, he was elected a deputy of the National Assembly.