Since his youth, he showed a vocation for painting, being 10 years old when he participated as a drawer of flora and fauna in a scientific expedition through Northeastern Brazil led by the French naturalist Louis Jacques Brunet.

His performance at the academy made him known even to Emperor Pedro II, who sponsored a trip to Paris and studies at the École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts, where the artist perfected his style, mainly in historical painting.

In 1885, according to records made by imperial adviser Joaquim Inácio Ramalho, Américo declared to the commission of works, that he would charge himself with making a historical painting in memory of the glorious act of Prince Regent Pedro, proclaiming the Brazilian independence.

In December of the same year, the newspaper A Província de São Paulo published an article criticising the government's behaviour, accusing it of giving false hopes to the artist, considered at the time a master of aesthetics.

[7] The experience he had 10 years earlier, with his work Batalha do Avaí, that was not well received by critics, classifying it as "anti-academical" (Portuguese: antiacadêmica), made him study in more depth aesthetic topics and publish the literary work Discurso Sobre o Plágio na Literatura e na Arte (Discourse On Plagiarism in Literature and Art) in 1879, years before beginning Independência ou Morte.

According to the historian, the critics saw in Independência ou Morte, a whole scene copy of 1807, Friedland, painted thirteen years earlier by Meissonier, "in which he also portrays Napoleon, a polyvalent figure that serves as a model for Américo to paint both Caxias and D. Pedro I, this one giving the cry of independence at the bank of the Ipiranga" (Portuguese: "em que este também retrata Napoleão, figura polivalente que tanto serve de modelo para Américo pintar Caxias como D. Pedro I, este dando o grito de independência às margens do Ipiranga.").

[9] According to the art historian Maraliz de Castro, the work by Américo has major differences from the paintings by Meissonier, saying the Brazilian concerns himself with every detail, searching for a balance between all the elements, with the goal of creating a significant impression of unity, while in Napoleon III at the Battle of Solferino, the Frenchman wished to simulate an instantaneous photography of reality differently from the carefully organised figures in Independência ou Morte.

According to Maraliz, another difference is the movement in the painting by Meissonier: the soldiers run frenetically in direction to the viewer; however Américo composes a form in ellipsis to make up all the characters of the scene, uniting them to the use of perspective.

[11] There was also a contemporary accusation of plagiarism published in 1982 by the journalist Elio Gaspari, in his column in the magazine Veja, also refuted by Cláudia Valladão, that comments on the publication: "accusing Pedro Américo of plagiarism is not understand the assumptions of his art" (Portuguese: "acusá-lo [Pedro Américo] de plágio é não compreender os pressupostos de sua arte").

[14] The painting by Pedro Américo appears constantly in Brazilian didactic books, therefore becoming a "canonical image" (Portuguese: "imagem canônica") in the teaching of history in Brazil.

[15] A study with children has shown that in part due to the influence of the illustrations in didactic books, they represented the act of independence inspired by the graphical reference of Independência ou Morte.

In the painting by Albuquerque, the protagonist of the declaration of independence becomes Maria Leopoldina, in a scene where she is shown deliberating with the Council of the Attorneys-general of the Provinces of Brazil the direction to Dom Pedro to end the colonisation of Brazil by Portugal; in the painting by Bracet, Dom Pedro appears as the protagonist of the separation from Portugal, but in a domestic setting and in a jovial attitude, composing the Hino da Independência (Independence Anthem).