All photographs used in this work are part of my family archives.

Complete text in Portuguese available here.

The matriarchs of my family had experienced a series of traumatic events in their bodies - postpartum depression, miscarriage, surgical removal of the thyroid and hysterectomy - but adequate treatments were not offered to them. Their traumas, emotional and hormonal imbalances were never properly addressed.

My grandmother had debilitating moments of depression. For some periods of time, the family even moved temporarily to relatives' homes when my grandmother became incapable to maintain her household in order. When my grandparents emigrated from Rio de Janeiro to the United States, in the 1950’s, the depression she suffered throughout her adult life was treated with tranquilizers. The drug Miltown (meprobamate) became available on the market in 1955 and quickly became the first psychotropic drug in United States history to achieve record sales.

This tranquilizer was freely prescribed for the treatment of depressed women in the cosmopolitan American context. The psychological and physical dependence generated by this medication, even when taken within prescribed quantities, was ignored. In just two years it became the best-selling medical prescription in the United States. One of the factors that contributed to Miltown becoming enmeshed in popular culture was its use among celebrities in the movie industry. Addiction became particularly noticeable among Hollywood artists of that period.

Only in 1967, limits were imposed on the number of prescriptions and duration of treatments with Miltown due to the physical and psychological dependence it generated in users. Finally in 2012, the European Union suspended the marketing of this medication due to the serious side effects observed. Despite being rarely prescribed nowadays, this medicine popularly informally called the “peace pill” is still available in the American market today.

“… well suited for prolonged therapy.”

- Disclaimer of prescription drug Miltown.

“… true butterfly of tranquility”

- Final words of text written by Salvador Dali describing his commisioned work “Crisalida” (1958)

In 1963 a new antidepressant was released into the market. My grandmother began to be prescribed and medicated with Valium. This medication’s advertising campaigns purposely targeted a female audience offering a quick and easy solution to the problem of being a woman - no matter if she was the tired mother, the stressed executive or a spinster. After a decade of campaigns aimed at the domestic and female market, the pharmaceutical industry had created its ideal consumer - housewives apparently became the main users of tranquilizers - the little pills are still called “mother’s little helper”.

O Laboratorio Carter que produz a medicacao Miltown comercializava “Little Nerve Pills” desde o final do seculo XIX com campanhas publicitarias direcionadas especialmente ao publico feminino.

Decades later, when my mother went through her own crisis of depression in Brazil in the 1980’s, her diagnosis was determined within a religious context. Spiritualist origins based on the syncretism between Christianity, spiritualism and Candomblé were considered the origin and consequence for the depressive episodes that I cyclically witnessed during my childhood. Not even the extreme side effects she experienced during the use of pshychiatric drugs, culminating in suicidal behavior, were addressed. Instead of medical treatment, promises and blessings were performed - including the offering of an ex-voto wax head in the old Metropolitan Cathedral of Rio de Janeiro to “Our Lady of the Head” asking for a cure.

Growing up in New York, after migrating from Brazil at 9 year’s old in 1949, my mother would listen to Father Patrick Peyton's litany on radio and television - a priest who would be funded by the C.I.A. to instigate anti-comunist fervor on the streets of Brazil promoting “Family Marches with God for Freedom” in preparation for the military coup of 1964.

The pro-American doctrine came in the suitcase along with the rosary, when my father, recently married and a graduate student in New York City, was hired by General Motors’ headquarters in São Paulo. Multinationals were multiplying in Brazil and so was my mother. With a ring on her finger, and the North American “Alliance for Progress” policy in full swing in Brazil, my mother gives birth in São Paulo in the 1970’s.

batmacumbaiéié batmacumbaoba
batmacumbaiéié batmacumbao
batmacumbaiéié batmacumba
batmacumbaiéié batmacum
batmacumbaiéié batman
batmacumbaiéié bat
batmacumbaiéié ba
batmacumbaiéié
batmacumbaié
batmacumba
batmacum
batman
bat
ba
bat
batman
batmacum
batmacumba
batmacumbaié
batmacumbaiéié
batmacumbaiéié ba
batmacumbaiéié bat
batmacumbaiéié batman
batmacumbaiéié batmacum
batmacumbaiéié batmacumbao
batmacumbaiéié batmacumbaoba

“Batbacumba”, lyrics by Caetano Veloso and Gilberto Gil, Gravação Tropicália ou panis et circensis, Philips, R 765.040L (1968).

“Quero perder de vez tua cabeça, 
Minha cabeça perder teu juízo, 
Quero cheirar fumaça de óleo diesel
”

Song Cálice, by Chico Buarque and Milton Nascimento.

Religiosity as a form of self-protection becomes an obsession beyond the mother’s body. The innocence of childhood began to be protected at any cost - the mother becomes a zealot against two growing bodies - while the emotional imbalance would gradually undermine control over her own.

The mixing of repression and religion that little by little dominated the family space did not seem so absurd. Not even the sewing of blessed medals in clothing. For years on the streets of Brazil, led by the military and the elite, thousands had been exorcising the country with rosary in hand in order to rid the country of the bodies of those so called communists.

“só quero agasalhar meu anjo.”

- “Angélica”, Song by Chico Buarque dedicated to Zuzu Angel assasinated during the military dictoriaship in Brazil.

“Quando a porca torce o rabo
Pode ser o diabo
E ora vejam só.”

- “Bicharia” from the record “Os Saltimbancos” by Chico Buarque

"our unworthiness because of our countless faults.”

- Prayer to Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal.

Just like my body’s maturing, the dictatorship was better covered up. The core of the family chose to ignore, not to know, not to recognize the dictatorship. They did the same with mental illness. The erasure of these two facts continues to this day.

My childhood came and went during a dictatorial regime, without the knowledge of stories of women like Miriam Leitão, Zuzu Angel, Aurora Marta Nascimento Furtado that resisted the dictatorial government. The hundreds of tortured, disappeared, imprisoned and assassinated during the Brazilian dictatorship were lost to me in the echo of propaganda - all I ever heard was: “what is good for the United States is good for Brazil.”

“ Fighting for your rights
And the old red, white, and blue ”

- Theme song TV series “Wonder Woman” (1975-1979)

“Você precisa aprender inglês
Precisa aprender o que eu sei”

“Baby” by Caetano Veloso, Gravação Gal Costa, Philips, R 765.098 L (1969).

I grew up in Belo Horizonte completely abstracted from the political repression that was happening around me. Right there in the city’s center was one of the main areas of illegal incarceration during the military dictatorship: DOPS - Departamento de Ordem Política e Social. Downtown at Avenida Afonso Pena, 2351, inside a cork-covered room, torture was being perpetrated against those who resisted the dictatorial government. In my political innocence, any sound of resistance went unnoticed.

“Às cinco horas na avenida central
Mas as pessoas da sala de jantar
são ocupadas em nascer e morrer”

Panis et Circensis. Song by Gilberto Gil e Caetano Veloso. Marisa Monte. Barulhinho Bom, EMI, 854211 2, 1996.

After 21 years of a dictatorial government, a civil president was elected. He died suddenly. It was the first time I wrote about death. The second time, I didn't write about it because my mother’s death didn't happen. It was just an attempt. We installed bars on the windows on the seventh floor and admired the landscape as if they weren’t there. The attempt happened only once, and never again. Miracles do happen.

“…in high doses it can lead the individual to suicidal behavior.”

- contraindications in anti-depressant leaflets.

Complete text in Portuguese available here.

AMERI_CANA

DEPRESSION. POSSESSION. REPRESSION is part of a series of works where I explore spaces between myth and reality, tales and memory, history and fables. In passed down stories, the unfinished tracings of the diaspora of multiple generations leaves gaps that welcome the imagination and delusional fantasies of identity, while historical documents eliminate any minimization of our ancestral colonial roles - from the Brazilian northeast to the American northeast - From sugarcane to a dream of America.

REFERENCES

Alves, M.M. (1968). Beaba dos MEC-USAID

Andujar, C., Nogueira, T., Andujar, C., & Andujar, C. (2015). Claudia Andujar: No lugar do outro. IMS.

Azoulay, A. (2022). The Civil Contract of photography. Zone Books.

Azoulay, A. (2019). Potential history: Unlearning Imperialism. Verso.

Azoulay, A. (2018). Civil imagination: Ontologia Politica della fotografia. Postmedia books.

Borges, C. J. P., & Merlino, T. (2019). Heroínas desta história : mulheres em busca de justiça por familiares mortos pela ditadura. Instituto Vladimir Herzog.

Galeano, E., & Belfrage, C. (1973). Open veins of Latin America : five centuries of the pillage of a continent. New York: Monthly Review Press.

Iversen, M. (2017). Photography, Trace, and trauma. The University of Chicago Press.

Lage, C. (2019). O corpo interminável (1a edição). Editora Record.

Larangeira, A. (2014). A mídia e o regime militar. Editora Sulina.

Leitão, M. (2017). Em nome dos pais. Intrínseca.

Leitão, Miriam. (2014). Tempos Extremos: Romance. Intrínseca.

Manchete. Rio de Janeiro, RJ: Bloch, 30 de maio de 1964. Disponível em: http://memoria.bn.br/DocReader/docreader.aspx?bib=004120. Acesso em: 28 Mar. 2024.

Alves, M.M. (1968). Beaba dos MEC-USAID

Motta, R. P. S. (2020). On guard against the red menace : anti-communism in Brazil, 1917-1964. Sussex Academic Press.

Motta, R. P. S. (2023). A present past : the Brazilian military dictatorship and the 1964 coup. Sussex Academic Press.

Nunes, Paulo Giovani Antonino. “Golpe Civil-Militar e Repressão No Imediato Pós-Golpe: Os Casos Da Paraíba e de Minas Gerais (Civil-Military Coup and Repression in the Immediate Post-Coup: The Cases of Paraíba and Minas Gerais) - DOI: 10.5752/P.2237-8871.2014v15n22p63.” Cadernos de história. 15.22 (2014): n. pag. Web.

Patto, S. M. R. (2022). On guard against the red menace: Anti-communism in Brazil, 19171964. SUSSEX ACADEMIC PRESS.

Quain, J., Sharpey-Schäfer, E. A. (Edward A., & Thane, G. D. (1890). Quain’s Elements of anatomy (10th ed.). Longmans, Green.

Starling, H. M. M., Lago, M., Bignotto, N. (2022). Linguagem da destruição: a democracia brasileira em crise. Brazil: Companhia das Letras.

Starling, Heloísa. Os Senhores das Gerais – Os Novos Inconfidentes e o Golpe de 1964. Petrópolis: Editora Vozes, 1986

Schwarcz, L. M. (2022). Brazilian authoritarianism: Past and present. Princeton University Press.

Schwarcz, L. M., & Murgel, S. H. M. (2020). Brazil: A Biography. Picador.

Tone, A. (2009). The age of anxiety: A history of America’s turbulent affair with Tranquilizers. Basic Books.

Tone, A. (2007). Medicating modern america: Prescription drugs in history. New York Univ. Press.

Vesalius, A., Saunders, J. B. deC. M. (John B. deCusance M., & O\’Malley, C. Donald. (1982). The anatomical drawings of Andreas Vesalius : with annotations and translations, a discussion of the plates and their background, authorship, and influence, and a biographical sketch of Vesalius. Bonanza Books.

Wallace Pharmaceuticals, “An Eminent Role in Medical Practice,” American Institute of the History of Pharmacy Digital Collection, accessed May 4, 2024, https://aihp.omeka.net/items/show/687.

Weir, S. (n.d.). Surrealist architecture: Dalí’s 1958 CRISALIDA, San Francisco. Journal of Surrealism and the Americas. https://jsa-asu.org/index.php/JSA/article/view/245

Wilford, H. (2008). The mighty Wurlitzer : how the CIA played America. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press.

 A_CAMADO(A) (BEDRRIDEN).

Texto em Português disponível aqui.

My great-grandfather went blind. It was not a gradual process, but sudden. He did not follow medical advice after having cataract surgery. He was blinded because he insisted on watering the garden. That is what I was told.

This work is an imaginary exercise exploring identity and self-definition: if I were at the foot of his bed, how would I self-describe when I first introduced myself to my great-grandfather, who became blind at the end of his life?

”I am a Latino woman in my late 40s, with shoulder length brown hair and average height.” - I would say. But, only when I became a Brazilian living in North America I began to auto-describe myself as a person of color. In the Brazilian social context, I am a white woman. To omit such a description would be to fail to recognize that generations of my family enjoyed certain privileges in our home country because of this lighter layer of skin.

“Being white consists of being the owner of symbolic and material racial privileges.”

Branquitude Estudos sobre a identidade Branca no Brasil - Cardoso, (2017).

At the foot of the bed, each of my gestures is an attempt to touch my ancestry at the heart of our coloniaty in order to transmute it. Do we know who we are? Do we know who we were? I whisper: “Know thyself” and, be no longer what you once were.

“In his own whiteness, the blind man may come to doubt”

- Saramago, Ensaio sobre a cegueira, (1995)

References:

Benjamin, Ruha. Viral Justice: How We Grow the World We Want, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2022. https://doi.org/10.1515/9780691222899

Menakem, R. My grandmother's hands : racialized trauma and the pathway to mending our hearts and bodies. .

Müller Tânia Mara, & Cardoso Lourenço. (2017). Branquitude Estudos sobre a identidade Branca no Brasil. Appris Editora.

Saramago José. (1995). Ensaio sobre a Cegueira. Harcourt, Inc.

AMERI_CANA

A_CAMADO(A) is part of a series of works called AMERI_CANA where I explore spaces between myth and reality, tales and memory, history and fables. In passed down stories, the unfinished tracings of the diaspora of multiple generations leaves gaps that welcome the imagination and delusional fantasies of identity, while historical documents eliminate any minimization of our ancestral colonial roles - from the Brazilian northeast to the American northeast - From sugarcane to a dream of America.

#ameri_cana #decolonizing #familyhistory #ancestralhealing #ancestralidade #genealogia #latinidade #identidade #workinprogress #photography #archives #migration #diaspora #america #cana #canadeaçucar #plantations #sugarcane

GAME OF FORTUNE

Texto completo em Português disponível aqui

On the 17th of May 1925, the newspaper A Provincia of the city of Recife announced the auction of all the assets of my maternal family. The exaltation of family members and recreational travel plans are prominently printed in the initial lines, but between the lines, the ruin of a family is revealed, which would hastily board a ship and leave the Northeast of Brazil, never returning to their homeland.

Gradually, the lines of the ad become contradicting and describe in detail personal objects, furniture and clothing offered for sale - including the auction of the family home. What is not allowed to be mentioned either in the pages of the newspaper, or in conversations between family members, are the details of how the entire fortune was lost.

It was supposedly in bets and card games that João Vieira Arcoverde lost his family fortune. One hundred years later, these are the rumors that remain from this chapter in our history. The only vestige of its veracity is the lifelong aversion his daughter, my maternal grandmother, had to card games.

If the way in which the family's fortune was lost was kept under lock and key, the way in which the family made its fortune was never a secret. It was always openly discussed the ownership of several sugar cane plantations, and that of enslaved people, which is intrinsically part of the cultivation of this crop. As operators of sugar cane plantations, the accumulation of wealth in my family's matriarchal line was only possible in the 19th century through their participation in the colonial machine powered by slave labor.

Using the family archive, a deck of cards was created. Photos of my ancestors illustrate the suits of playing cards. The meaning of each minor arcana card reveals the loss of fortune in gambling, and a family that suddenly breaks down.

The icons of the major arcana of the tarot, on the other hand, describe the moral ruin of those who acquire their fortune through voluntary participation in the human enslavement, and the use of enslaved labor acquired at auction 'by the hammer'.

This work is as much about how a fortune was lost as how it was made. The cards don't lie: sugar cane is behind it all.

Click to see full deck.

MATCHBOX

Complete text and short film in English available here.

Como uma das finalistas de um concurso de beleza, minha avó materna, Maria Eulina Vieira dos Santos, seria premiada com sua foto estampada em caixas de fósforo. Noiva aos 15 anos, seu futuro marido não aprovou tal prêmio. Ela terminou o noivado no dia 13 de maio clamando sua liberdade e exclamando: “Neste dia a escravidão foi abolida” - referenciando a ingênua perspectiva histórica de que a assinatura de uma lei em 13 de maio de 1888 libertava populações de escravizados no Brasil da sistêmica expectativa e imposição de submissão, inferioridade e servitude.

Neste ritual fotográfico uso como fonte o texto original publicado em 1922 pela revista Era Nova promovendo um concurso de beleza. Reproduzo o vocabulário utilizado para descrever as mulheres da elite do estado da Paraíba premiadas no evento. Estas palavras são datilografadas e inseridas individualmente em caixas de fósforos que figuram minha avó materna, uma das participantes do concurso. 

Fósforos são continuamente acesos na tentativa de iluminar as atribuições de tom colonial usadas para descrever minha ancestral branca. A chama revela as palavras que repousam em cada caixa expondo a distorcida representação de branquitude como padrão de beleza e superioridade.

A cega superioridade branca que permeia as palavras descrevendo a matriarca de minha família são pronunciadas em voz alta e iluminadas pela chama. Cada um dos fósforo é subsequentemente apagado para representar a minha intenção de extinguir e não mais perpetuar narrativas coloniais que permeiam a minha história de família passada e presente, intra e transgeracionalmente.

Short film with English subtitles and translated text available here.

Neste trabalho - parte pesquisa histórica, parte imaginário - confronto o direito de uma mulher branca em comparar sua falta de autonomia com aquela de um corpo escravizado. A subjugação da mulher prevalencente em uma sociedade patriarcal é mero pano de fundo para expor o quão inapropriado é o ato de comparar a submissão de uma mulher branca com a sistemática opressão, tortura e apropriação de seres humanos. Especialmente sendo esta mulher membro de uma família que beneficiou-se do trabalho de escravizados no século XIX, como operantes de engenhos de cana-de-açúcar no Brasil - a última nação ocidental à proclamar a abolição.

Criei réplicas imaginárias das caixas de fósforo estampadas com a fotografia premiada no concurso de beleza. A foto originalmente publicada é reproduzida e cada uma das caixas de fósforo é duplicada em negativo. Uma tentativa de representar visualmente o quão errônea é esta apropriação de negritude por uma mulher branca. Ao ser transmitida de geração a geração, a propagação contínua desta narrativa se deteriora pela sua inveracidade, assim como a reprodução mecânica contínua de uma imagem, e os vestígios que ficaram são opressões incompatíveis e incomparáveis.

Deterioração é parte intrínseca deste trabalho já que a imagem idealizada de mulher é tão inatingível quanto é inaceitável, assim como o padrão de beleza ostentado e imposto por uma elite que insiste em sustentar a raça branca como “representantes da humanidade”.

“A branquitude repousa sobre uma premissa fundamental: a definição dos brancos como a norma ou padrão para o ser humano e as pessoas de cor como um desvio dessa norma.”

- Robin Diangelo, White Fragility (2017)

Complete English version available here.

References:

DiAngelo, R. White fragility : why it's so hard for White people to talk about racism. .

Diniz de Souza, V. (2019). A violência simbólica e o antifeminismo: uma análise da revista Era Nova (Parahyba, 1920). Revista Aedos, 11(24), 367–387. Recuperado de https://seer.ufrgs.br/index.php/aedos/article/view/83193

Hemeroteca Digital. Fundação Biblioteca Nacional.

Jornal A Província. Publicações "Eulina". (1920, March 30). Hemeroteca Digital. Fundação Biblioteca Nacional. http://memoria.bn.br/DocReader/DocReader.aspx?bib=128066_02&pagfis=696

Jornais e folhetins literários da Paraíba no século XIX - Centro de Ciencias Humanas, Letras e Arte - Universidade Federal da Paraiba. (2007). João Pessoa, PB. Retrieved January 28, 2023, from https://www.cchla.ufpb.br/jornaisefolhetins/sobre.html.

DESCONHECIDO. As Rainhas da Formosura Parahybana. Sta. Maria Eulina Vieira. Revista Era Nova, ano 2, Edição do Centenário - pagina 13. Retrieved January 28, 2023, from https://www.cchla.ufpb.br/jornaisefolhetins/acervo/Era_Nova_1922_ano_II/DR_SOLON_BARBOSA_LUCENA5.pdf

DESCONHECIDO. Concurso de Belleza. E eleita a Parahybana mais bella. Revista Era Nova, ano 2, n. 33. - 1 de Setembro de 1922. Jornais e folhetins literários da Paraíba no século XIX - Centro de Ciencias Humanas, Letras e Arte - Universidade Federal da Paraiba. (2007). João Pessoa, PB. Retrieved January 28, 2023, from https://www.cchla.ufpb.br/jornaisefolhetins/acervo/Era_Nova_1922_ano_II/ERA_NOVA_01_09_1922.pdf

DESCONHECIDO. Concurso de Belleza. Sua ultima etapa na Parahyba - o premio da “Era Nova”. Revista Era Nova, ano 2, n. 34. - 1 de outubro de 1922. Jornais e folhetins literários da Paraíba no século XIX - Centro de Ciencias Humanas, Letras e Arte - Universidade Federal da Paraiba. (2007). João Pessoa, PB. Retrieved January 28, 2023, from http://www.cchla.ufpb.br/jornaisefolhetins/acervo/Era_Nova_1922_ano_II/ERA_NOVA_01_10_1922.pdf

Menakem, R. My grandmother's hands : racialized trauma and the pathway to mending our hearts and bodies. .

MENDES, J. S. "Rainhas da formosura": política e beleza nos concursos de Miss Parahyba do Norte (1922-1929). 2016. 66f. Trabalho de Conclusão de Curso (Graduação em História) - Universidade Estadual da Paraíba, Campina Grande, 2016. Recuperado de http://dspace.bc.uepb.edu.br/jspui/handle/123456789/10090

Oliveira V. de. (1974). Mundo submerso : memórias. Companhia Editora de Pernambuco.

Peebles, F. d. P. (2008). The seamstress: a novel (First edition). HarperCollins.

Peebles, F. d. P. (2018). The air you breathe . Riverhead Books.

Portal Midia. (2022, November 15). As Mais Belas paraibanas no centenário da independência - portal mídia. Portal Mídia - O maior portal de Guarabira e do Brejo. Retrieved January 28, 2023, from https://portalmidia.net/as-mais-belas-paraibanas-no-centenario-da-independecia/

AMERI_CANA

Matchbox faz parte de uma série de trabalhos chamado AMERI_CANA é série de trabalhos em que exploro espaços entre mito e realidade, contos e memória, história e fábulas. Nestes casos de família, o inacabado traçado da diáspora de inúmeras gerações deixam lacunas que acolhem a imaginação e fantasias de identidade, enquanto documentos históricos eliminam qualquer minimização de nossos ancestrais papéis coloniais - do nordeste do Brasil ao nordeste Estado Unidense - da cana à um sonho de América do Norte. O curta-metragem Matchbox é um desses capítulos.

#ameri_cana #decolonizing #familyhistory #ancestralhealing #ancestralidade #genealogia #latinidade #identidade #workinprogress #photography #archives #migration #diaspora #america #cana #canadeaçucar #plantations #sugarcane

RIO/MINE

RIO/MINE

I recreate the telegraph tapes used in the stock market to represent the gradual process in which a river would become a mere ticker symbol of a stock. On these paper strips, I repeat the acronym RIO - the ticker symbol of the shares of Companhia Vale do Rio Doce when, in 2000, it became the first Brazilian company traded on the New York Stock Exchange. RIO has now the same meaning as a mine. This interchangeable meaning of two words, one in Portuguese and one in English, displays in typography the conflicting interests between Brazil and the United States.

This work emerged from my own attempt to understand the international forces that operate the mining industry in Minas Gerais, Brazil. The desire for appropriation of the natural resources in our territory has permeated our history for centuries - from the exploration of gold to iron ore. Such greed is represented here by the use of maps from the United States Library of Congress in which the Brazilian territory is recorded. The Rio Doce river basin is often depicted on these maps, even when knowledge about the vastness of our geography and the richness of our subsoil were still incipient. They wanted emeralds, diamonds, gold, and finally ore. They outlined us to undress us.

There is nothing gentle about this striping. To represent the sequelae and level of morbidity the soil, air and water carry from the exploitation of the mining industry, I make interventions on hydrographic maps of Minas Gerais and insert the image of the scar I carry on my own chest after a cancer diagnosis. I expose the land stripped of its immense riches, but that despite its profound malaise, still in its core seeks healing in every curve of its rivers, just as I seek cure in every curve of my veins.

Texto completo em Português disponível aqui.

In this work, the tangled conflicts of domestic Brazilian economic needs and the speculative gains of international investors symbolically overflow the frame as it spreads across the floor in the form of paper streamers. Not unlike when on the streets of the Financial District, ribbons of telegraph tapes from the stock exchange were thrown out the window at important national celebrations. Called “Ticker Tape Parades” such celebrations are usually reserved for American heroes such as the inaugurated president JFK, the astronauts from Mercury and Apollo missions and, select world leaders, among them three Brazilian presidents - Júlio Prestes, Dutra and João Goulart - were decorated between 1930 and 1962, demonstrating the American interests in Brazilian politics in crucial decades of our history.

Prophesied in old colonial agreements, perpetuated in modernizing economic pacts and reinforced by gradual foreign capitalization, the definitive privatization of Brazil’s first and largest iron ore producer - Companhia Vale do Rio Doce - took place in 1997. Foreign hands have shaped this company from its early beginnings. Created in 1942 during the government of President Getúlio Vargas, through financing by the American government and motivated mainly by the need to sustain the US participation in World War II, this mining company has been negotiating its shares in the financial market since1943.

The mining industry’s extractivist nature and its extreme socio-environmental impacting practices culminates with the denationalization of Companhia Vale do Rio Doce and a blind process of autophagy in its relation to land, river and man is unleashed. All it sees are profits. Once privatized, the interests of investors and shareholders prevail. As a multinational, the company saw its market value explode from BRL 7 billion to BRL 200 billion between 2001 and 2010. And so, it begins in its operations in Minas Gerais, the trail of environmental infringements that inevitably generate the unimaginable losses during the tailling dam crimes of Mariana in 2015, and Brumadinho in 2019: both in lives and in rivers.

In 2009, the acronym RIO would be replaced on the stock exchange when the world's largest iron ore producer changed its acronym and company name to VALE, prophesying the unimaginable - the Rio Doce in Minas Gerais, Brazil could one day disappear off the map.

~ Dedicated to D.K.

Where these maps come from?

The maps used in this project come from the a digitized collection from the Library of Congress (LOC) - “The United States and Brazil collection” - a collaboration between the Library of Congress and the National Library of Brazil. It archives interactions between Brazil and the United States going back to the eighteenth century. The United States and Brazil: Expanding Frontiers, Comparing Cultures is either on public domain or have no known copyright restrictions and are free to use and reuse, according to LOC’s website.

Source:

Expanding frontiers, comparing cultures libraries collaborate on U.S.-Brazilian Web Site. Expanding Frontiers, Comparing Cultures (July 2004) - Library of Congress Information Bulletin. (n.d.). Retrieved September 6, 2022, from https://www.loc.gov/loc/lcib/0407/cultures.html

#RIOSHARES

#RIOshares is as much of a hashtag as it is a google search. In 2009, Companhia Vale do Rio Doce removed RIO from its stock ticker symbol. But the monopoly of iron ore production is a small circle - they not only share profits and markets in acquisition schemes and appropriation takeovers but they also happen to exchange ticker symbols too. After VALE S.A. relinquished the ticker symbol RIO from its stocks in 2009, one of largest mining companies in the world gladly absorbed this 3-letter-acronym for its shares. The River became once again a stock.

MAIN BIBLIOGRAPHY:

Bautista Vidal José Walter. (2000). Brasil: Civilização Suicida. Ed. Nação do Sol.

Mikesell, R. F. (1971). Foreign investment in the petroleum and Mineral Industries. Hopkins.

Moura, E., Godeiro, N., Soares, P., & Vieira, V. (2007). Vale do rio doce: Nem Tudo que reluz É ouro: Da privatizaçao à luta pela reestatizaçao. Sundermann.

Pimenta. (1981). A Vale do Rio Doce & sua história. Editoral Vega.

Ragazzi. ROCHA, Lucas Ragazzi. Murillo. (2021). Brumadinho;a Engenharia de Um Crime. EDITORA LETRAMENTO.

Silva, Marta Zorzal E., . (2004). A Vale do rio doce: Na estratégia do Desenvolvimentismo Brasileiro. EDUFES.

Wisnik. (2018). Maquinação do mundo : Drummond e a mineração (1a ed.). Companhia das Letras.

OPEN SOURCE MAPS:

Aa, P. V. D. (1729) Brazil: According to New Surveys by Messrs. of the Royal Academy of Sciences, etc. [Leiden: Publisher Not Identified] [Map] Retrieved from the Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/item/2021668297/.

Blaeu, W. J. (1631) New Image of Brazil. [Amsterdam, Holland: publisher not identified] [Map] Retrieved from the Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/item/2021668368/.

Carey, M. (1814) A map of Brazil, now called New Portugal. [S.l] [Map] Retrieved from the Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/item/2001620474/.

Companhia Lithographica Hartmann-Reichenbach & Calmon, M. (1908) Mappa geral da Republica dos Estados Unidos do Brasil. [S.l] [Map] Retrieved from the Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/item/2001620472/.

Cunha, E. A. L., Calmon, M., Gama, A., Luiz, E. D. E., Roosevelt, B. & Roosevelt, T. (1910) Carta da viação ferrea do Brasil. [São Paulo: Secção Geographica Artistica da Compa. Lith. Hartmann-Reichenbach] [Map] Retrieved from the Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/item/2003682784/.

Imperial Instituto Artístico. (1902) Brazil, Provincial Railroads. [S.l.: Lith: do Imperial Instituto Artistico, ?] [Map] Retrieved from the Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/item/2003627072/.

Matos, J. R. D. C. (1800) Map of Doce and Jequitinhonha Rivers Copied from Documents Found in the House of Representatives. [Place of Publication Not Identified: Publisher Not Identified, to 1839] [Map] Retrieved from the Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/item/2021668348/.

Niemeyer, C. J. D., Ponte Ribeiro, D. D. P. R. & Tourinho, M. C. (1873) Map of the Brazilian Empire. [Rio de Janeiro: publisher not identified] [Map] Retrieved from the Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/item/2021668361/.

Rocha, J. J. D. (1779) Map of the District of Villa Rica. [Place of Publication Not Identified: Publisher Not Identified] [Map] Retrieved from the Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/item/2021668330/.

Sanson, N. (1656) Brazil, which Coast is a Portuguese Possession, Divided into Fourteen Captaincies, Showing the Middle of the Country Inhabited by Many Unknown Peoples. Paris: Chez Pierre Mariette. [Map] Retrieved from the Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/item/2021668385/.

Sanson, N. (1656) Le Bresil. Paris. [Map] Retrieved from the Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/item/2003627080/.

The November 5th 2015 disaster in Mariana, Minas Gerais is to this day the largest environmental crime in the history of Brazil and the largest in the world involving a tailing dam. The 7th anniversary of the disaster is here and the immeasurable damage it unleashed on those who depend on the Rio Doce is desperately palpable.

Because of the heavy-metal-infested-waters: main municipalities along the river banks have to monitor its water supply; fishing villages can no longer nourish themselves from the fish; and the main indigenous community on the watershed of the Rio Doce - the Krenak people - has to rely on the delivery of food and water trucks for their survival. their culture, spirituality and way of living that has been always connected to the Rio Doce is now indefinetly disturbed. 

HELP THE KRENAK @institutosdk

Share the river. Let it be known.

FOLLOW IT ON INSTAGRAM

the #RIOshares hashtag will be used to share images of the Rio Doce. Share images from the past so we don’t forget the river we’ve lost; and share images of how the river and its water, fauna and flora are today so the environmental impacts that are now pervasive throughout the Rio Doce water basin can no longer be minimized.

BORDERLINE: A MANIFESTO

I am a vast territory, you will never own. You don't course through me, I course through you. Hear my voice. Sound travels over you. My birthplace has been written. I am a living document. I have my own identity so don't tell me what I am not. Beware of where you cut me through because you die when I die.

We are a vast territory, you will never own. You don't course through us, we course through you. Hear our voice. Sound travels over you. Our birthplace has been written. We are living documents. We have our own identity so don't tell us what we are not. Beware of where you cut us through because you die when we die.

This is a vast territory, you will never own. You don't course through it, it courses through you. Hear its voice. Sound travels over you. A birthplace has been written. There are living documents. It has it's own identity so don't tell it what it is not. Beware of where you cut it through because you die when it dies.

ARTIST STATEMENT

Borderline is a group of images exploring topography and territoriality. It's a simple concept, tracing a line. But once it cuts through a body - human or earth-body - a roar emerges. This surging voice from the perspective of an individual, people or land is what is being explored - a sort of manifesto.

Once a line is drawn, what is owned, and what is not, becomes palpable; Belonging and longing merges, And a heightened peripheral vision is inevitable. A sensorial mapping and a scanning of our own surfaces takes place, as a question glides over it all: how could we possibly think individuals, people or land are ever contained by dotted lines.

In today's landscape where appropriation and zoning are used as solutions to an economic, political and social crisis, what becomes evident is the borderline disorder of governments. The U.S. border portrayed could be easily interchanged by the Russian-UKRAINIAN border, Turkish-Syrian border, Israeli-Gaza border or the Brazilian-venezuelan border where my own country of origin must face the question - Where our countries end and our humanity begins?

A set of six silver-gelatin prints were the initial exploration. The writing on the glass frame is erasable, removable, impermanent, transient like borderlines eventually are. Although this work was generated in analog format, as a three-dimensional object, it easily translated into digital manifestations as shareable media files. These media files will be spread on my social media channels under hashtag #boderlinemanifesto.

In March 2022, Borderline is being shown at the exhibition THE ROAD HOME. MIGRATION, DISPLACEMENT AND REDIFINING WHERE WE LIVE at JKCGallery, a gallery for photography and lens-based work from international - and regional-noted artists located at Mercer County Community College in NJ.

ACTIVISM: #BORDERLINEMANIFESTO

Let a roar emerge. a surging voice of individuals, peoples or land. Take part in a small act of actvism and spread #borderlinemanifesto.

Here are some animated GIFs ready to download. Just share it throughout social media. Don't forget to insert the hashtag #borderlinemanifesto

M̶i̶n̶é̶RIO

The series of photographs M̶i̶n̶é̶RIO is a going back to the past. Not only as a revisiting of my own analog photographic archive and an excavation of images, but as an attempt to go back to a time when maybe a choice could have still been made: that of preserving a river and erasing mining off the map.

In 2009, the mining company Vale S.A. officially crossed out of it’s title the name of the river basin where its conglomerate was originated - Companhia Vale do Rio Doce. I titled this work M̶i̶n̶é̶RIO, and crossed out the word mine instead. By doing so I hope to sensitize our collective memory that behind a mine there is always a river. At least, there used to be one.

Here I present images of “Córrego do André”, one of the São João river basin tributaries. This stream, the villages and the population along the river are under an ungoing threat by the talling dam of “congo Soco” owned by Vale S.A. that is about to break and could cause flooding and contamination of all surroundings - water, earth, fauna, flora and air.

River and lives are suspended by a question: What will be crossed off the map?

If this environmental crime occurs it won’t be the first nor the last, a river basin from the state of Minas Gerais in Brazil is to be destroyed. The irresponsibility of the mining Company Vale do Rio Doce, now Vale S.A. - the largest producer of iron ore in the world - combined with government disregard and the complacency of society already eliminated from the landscape of Minas Gerais the ecosystems of the Rio Doce and Rio Paraopeba.

I bring these pictures to the surface, so we don’t become only a shadow of what we once were. a capacity not surprisingly so well performed by documentary photography. after all, shadows and its absence is all that a black and white photograph is made off.

~ To Max Henrique Barbosa

Scroll down for text version in Portuguese.

project M̶i̶n̶é̶RIO was shortlisted at Hariban Award 2019.

This year’s panel of jurors WAs made up of Annemarie Zethof & Martijn van Pieterson of IBASHO Gallery, Takayuki Ishii of Taka Ishii Gallery, Kimi Himeno of AKAAKA & Mirjam Kooiman of FOAM Museum Amsterdam.

2019 Shortlisted artists.

M̶i̶n̶é̶RIO

a série de fotografias M̶i̶n̶é̶RIO é uma tentativa de voltar ao passado. Não é só um revisitar do meu arquivo fotográfico e uma escavação de imagens, mas uma tentativa de voltar no tempo quando uma escolha talvez ainda fosse possível - a de preservar o rio e riscar a mineração do mapa.

Em 2007, a mineradora Vale S.A. riscou de seu nome original a bacia do Rio Doce onde este conglomerado se iniciou. Chamava-se Companhia Vale do Rio doce. Ao entitular este trabalho M̶i̶n̶é̶RIO, e riscar as letras iniciais, Risco a mina e deixo o rio. tento assim sensibilizar a nossa memória - que por trás do minério há sempre um rio; Ou pelo menos havia.

Aqui apresento imagens do córrego do André, um dos tributários da bacia do Rio São joão. Neste momento este afluente, assim como vilarejos e a população ribeirinha, estão ameaçadas por uma das barragens da Vale S.A. - a mina de rejeitos “Gongo Soco” que ameaça inundar e contaminar toda a cercania - água, terra, fauna, flora e ar.

Rio e vidas estão em suspense. E a pergunta fica: Será que seremos riscados do mapa?

Não será a primeira vez, e provavelmente nem a última, que uma bacia hidrográfica no Estado de Minas Gerais é ameaçada de destruição. A irresponsabilidade de Mineradoras como a Vale S.A.- A maior produtora de minério de ferro mundial - combinada com o desleixo governamental e a complacência social, já eliminaram da paisagem de Minas ecosistemas como os do Rio Doce e do rio paraopeba.

Trago estes retratos à tona, para que não restem apenas sombras daquilo que um dia fomos.

nada mais natural do que usar a fotografia documental, já que é da ausência e presença de sombras que a fotografia em preto e branco, pura e simplesmente é feita.

~ Para Max Henrique Barbosa

MINE_IRA

mine (pronoun) : that which belongs to me   

mine (noun) : a pit or excavation in the earth from which mineral substances are taken     

Texto em Português disponível abaixo.

Using my family’s archive and images of my own childhood I started to play with words - “mine” as a noun, and a possessive pronoun. But these two words quickly signified only one thing: that which is taken without permission.

Once defined as a mine the terrain is subjugated to desecration and exploitation. No better symbol to such acts than “Serra Curral Del Rey” - a mountain ridge in the brazilian state of Minas Gerais which corralled and gently embraced my existence and that of the inhabitants of my hometown of Belo Horizonte as I grew up. 

I traced its slopes from memory, as I’ve seen it through my child-eyes. The mountain is drawn over each photo - it’s by my feet when it was in front of me; above my head when behind me, and sometimes so close by my side, I could touch it. 

In this work the drawn ridge becomes a revealing layer - from negative to positive - bringing into light the hidden secrets of the mountain and that of my body - we were both continually corrupted and pillaged, we were both being abused. The mountain was consistently carved by the noun “mine”, and my innocence continually taken as a pronoun. “You are mine”, said an adult to a child. Not in words but in repetitive acts. Little by little we sustained devastation and loss while keeping our facades intact. By labeling the mountain-body and the child-body with the word “mine” these facts can no longer be ignored.

Of that mountain now only remains a hollowed shell. I hope to prevent humans from such un-souling. a reclaiming of the body can take place, and ownership can be transferred back to whom it rightly belongs If The word “mine” is self-proclaimed. in this instance, sovereignty is restored and can no longer be taken away. Not without blunt infringement, violation and betrayal. Something the mountain knows too well.

ThIs leads to the last bilingual word-play embedded in the type-setting of the title of this work. I am a so-called “MINEIRA” - someone from Minas Gerais. I tell it to anyone who cares to listen. And I have photographic proof of all stereotypical roles I’ve carried as such. But this romantic view of my origins. This idealized upbringing In a society ingrained In the mining culture means only one thing: I am a witness and an accomplice to multiple environmental crimes.

As the mountain watched over me, I watched as the mountain (and the other mountain, and another mountain…) was bluntly infringed, violated and betrayed.

“Mine_ira” can now only be written with a hyphen. Not as mere finger-pointing full of rage (ira) against the mine and the men behind it, but as self-responsibility for my own silence and inertia - as “mea-culpa. By relinquishing victimhood and accepting my role as participator and spectator I am now in a position to unleash “mine-rage” and call for the well overdue and deserved criminalization of the mining industry.

You are criminals. We all are.

MINE_IRA                                                     

Usando arquivos de família e imagens da minha própria infância, eu comecei a brincar com significados bilinguês. A palavra “Mine” - quando traduzida do inglês para português torna-se o pronome “Meu/minha”, e ao mesmo tempo, o substantivo “Mina”. Mas estas duas palavras rapidamente se traduziram num mesmo significado: aquilo que é tirado sem permissão.

Uma vez definido como “Mina”, o terreno torna-se desecrado e explorado. Não há melhor simbolismo para tais atos do que a “Serra do Curral Del Rey” - uma montanha no estado de Minas Gerais que congregava e getilmente abraçava minha existência e dos residentes da cidade de Belo Horizonte onde cresci.

Sobre a fotografia eu tracei a montanha que existia em minhas memórias. como me lembrava da serra do curral com meu olhar de criança. A montanha estava aos meus pés quando posicionada à minha frente; Acima da minha cabeça quando se encontrava às minhas costas, e às vezes ao meu lado, e tão próxima, que acreditava poder tocá-la.

Neste trabalho, o traçado da serra se torna um processo de revelação - de negativo para positivo. os segredos ocultos da montanha e aqueles em meu próprio corpo sendo aos poucos revelados - ambas estávamos sendo continuamente corrompidas e roubadas. Nós duas fomos repetidamente abusadas. A montanha estava sendo cavada pelo substantivo “Mina/MINE; e minha inocência transformada por um pronome. “Você é minha”, disse um adulto para uma criança, Não em palavras mas em atos. Pouco a pouco ambas sofremos devastação e perda enquanto mantínhamos nossas façadas intactas. Ao rotular o corpo-montanha e o corpo-criança com a palavra “Mina/Minha/Meu” tais fatos não mais podem ser ignorados.

Da montanha agora somente resta uma casca. Eu espero prevenir que corpos humanos sofram o mesmo fim. É possivel Clamar a posse de teu próprio corpo. A repatriaçāo pode ocorrer aos devidos donos. Mas é necessário que o pronome Minha/Meu/Mine seja proclamado pelo próprio indivíduo. neste caso, a soberania é restaurada e nāo mais pode ser tirada. Nāo sem uma escancarada infraçāo, violência e traiçāo. Isto a montanha sabe bem.

Finalmente a brincadeira bilíngue continua na tipografia do título deste trabalho. Eu sou conhecida como uma “mineira”- vinda de Minas Gerais. Eu declaro isto a qualquer um que esteja disposto a escutar. Eu tenho prova fotográfica De todos os estereótipos de que Participei exercendo tal papel. Mas esta visão romȃntica da minha infȃncia. Essa idealizaçao das minhas origens enraizada em uma cultura mineira tem apenas um significado: eu sou testemunha e cúmplice de múltiplos crimes ambientais.

Enquanto a montanha olhava por mim, eu olhava a montanha (e a outra montanha, e mais uma, e mais outra…) sendo infringida, violada e traída.

A palavra Mine_ira agora só poderá ser escrita desta maneira - com um hífen. Não como uma mera forma de apontar dedos cheios de ira contra a Mina e os homens por trás dela, mas direcionados para meu próprio silêncio e mInha inércia - como “mea culpa”, minha própria culpa. Ao largar meu papel de vítima e admitir minha participação como expectadora de um crime, eu posso então deslanchar minha ira e clamar pela mais que atrasada e merecida criminalização da indústria mineradora.

Vocês são criminosos. Todos nós somos.

~ Para Cláudia Franco Souza

MINE_IRA was one of the winners at 2019 Latin American Fotografia. Thanks again to @latinamericanfotografia competition jury:

Leslie dela Vega @leslie.delavega Director of Visuals, OZY MEDIA / USA; Verónica Sanchis @veronicasanchis Photo editor, Founder, @fotofeminas / VENEZUELA / HONG KONG; Ana Casas Broda @anacasasbroda Artist, Photoeditor INFRAMUNDO, co-director Hydra + Fotografía / SPAIN / MÉXICO; Alfredo de Stéfano, @alfredo_de_stefano_art Photographer, Visual Artist, Cultural Manager, Luz del Norte Fotografía / MÉXICO; Daniel Brena @danielbrena Director, Centro de las Artes de San Agustín / MÉXICO.

“LIBERTAS QUAE SERA TAMEN RESPEXIT INERTEM”

~ Virgilio

Scroll down for text in Portuguese.

In this part of my work based on my roots in Minas Gerais, Brazil I am suggesting a reinterpretation of my homestate’s motto and a redrawing of its state flag.

“LIBERTAS QUAE SERA TAMEN” is the label of Minas Gerais State which is based on a text by the Roman poet Virgil. When translated it means: "Liberty, even if delayed." Here the emphasis of our flag concentrates on the word “liberty” claimed during revolts against the Colony known as “Inconfidencia Mineira”.

But when the text in Latin is presented in its entirety “LIBERTAS QUAE SERA TAMEN RESPEXIT INERTEM” the focus of the phrase shifts to the closing word which means “inertia”.

I therefore suggest rewriting the motto of Minas Gerais using the later part of the text. “RESPEXIT INERTEM” can be translated as “IN MY IDLENESS”. By using this title I attempt a represent of a culture and history based on impunity and disregard of nature by institutions - both governmental and private. It becomes a recognition that Nature observes us in our inertia, as we do nothing to protect it from the exploitations of mining embedded in the culture of the State of Minas Gerais.

With this work I not only rewrite this State’s motto but also redesign its flag. Using a black triangle instead of the original one in red, I protest against the irresponsibility of the State in the dispersion of our natural resources. It becomes a sign of mourning. A sign of warning. The triangle signals danger. It is an invitation to be attentive to the imminent peril of rivers and the extinction of mountains from the State of Minas Gerais.

I suggest not only the reversal of color but a transmutation of the geometric form which is presented in reverse. On this position the triangle represents not only the Feminine Universe which Nature belongs to, but also the ancient alchemical symbol of water. By uniting geometry to the title “RESPEXIT INERTEM” - I make evident the incapacity of State and private institutions to preserve our rivers and mountains. “IN MY IDLENESS” becomes the voice of Nature looking upon structures of power: “You are doing nothing to protect me".

Through a series of interventions I will explore this geometric form. I will use this new 
“triângulo mineiro” as inspiration. Each time a triangle is drawn, traced, cut or knitted I will gradually envelop this geometry in a new hymm-mantra: “RESPEXIT INERTEM”. As if a prayer in Latin.

This is an invitation to deconstruction, retracing and recreation of an icon of Minas Gerais, and our way of living. There and everywhere.

I hope the simplicity of this gesture carries hermetically the recognition of a collective inertia existent only until now - “IN MY IDLENESS”. I hope this triangle symbolizes a desire for change and transmutation of a history based on exploitation of natural resources and our habitat. That from now on, there is a reversal of our past based on recurrent impunity against Nature. In this moment of our history we no longer stay idle. The destruction of our habitat no longer allow us to do so.

Texto completo em Português.

Nesta parte da série de trabalhos sobre as minhas origens no estado de Minas Gerais eu sugiro uma reinterpretação do lema do Estado e um redesenhar da bandeira mineira.

A ênfase de nossa bandeira se concentra na palavra “liberdade” clamada durante a Inconfidência Mineira, mas quando a frase baseada no texto em latim do poeta Romano Virgílio é apresentada em sua forma integral o foco é transferido para a palavra “inércia”.

”RESPEXIT INERTEM” pode ser traduzida como: “APESAR DA MINHA INERCIA”. Ao usar este título represento uma cultura e história baseadas na impunidade e irresponsabilidade de instituições governamentais e privadas com o meio-ambiente. Reconhecemos com esta frase que a natureza nos observa inertes perante sua destruição.

Ao redesenhar nossa bandeira com um triângulo negro faço um protesto contra a irresponsabilidade do Estado na dispersão de nossos recursos naturais. Torna-se um sinal de alerta. O triângulo significa um sinal de perigo. É um convite para ficarmos atentos perante a possível morte de nossos rios e extinção de nossas montanhas.

O protesto não ocorre apenas com a inversão da cor mas também com a transmutação da forma geométrica que apresento de forma invertida. Nesta posição o triângulo representa não só o universo feminino como referimos à mãe natureza, mas também, o símbolo alquímico do elemento água. Ao unir a geometria ao título “RESPEXIT INERTEM” - dou voz a incapacidade em se preservar rios e montanhas. Ao usar a frase: “APESAR DA MINHA INERCIA” damos voz a natureza dizendo ao Estado - “apesar da sua inercia” ainda estou aqui. Este triângulo simboliza um desejo de mudança e transformação da nossa historia.

Através de uma série de intervenções vou explorar esta forma geométrica. Usarei como inspiração este novo “triângulo mineiro”. Cada vez que um triângulo for desenhado, traçado, cortado ou tricotado eu gradativamente embuo na geometria um novo hino-mantra: “RESPEXIT INERTEM”.

Ao refazer, recriar, retraçar o ícone mineiro eu espero que a simplicidade deste gesto geométrico carregue hermeticamente a conscientização de nossa inércia coletiva existente até então - “APESAR DA MINHA INERCIA”. De agora em diante desejamos reverter nosso histórico de impunidades e irresponsabilidades recorrentes em relação à natureza. Neste momento da nossa história não mais ficaremos inertes. A destruição de nosso habitat não mais nos permite nenhuma inércia.

VISUAL CONCEPTIVE

Click here for a version of this project in Portuguese, my native language.

This is a minimalistic set of four photographs. Each image is my representation of a woman's weekly internal cycles.

PRINT EDITIONS HISTORY

1st Edition. (2013). 25 print sets + A.P. - Paper size: 8.5” x 11”; Image area approximately 7.5” x 7.5” inches.

Upcoming 2nd Edition. 25 print sets + 5 A.P. - Paper size: 13” x 19”; Image area approximately 11” x 11” inches.

#DAILYCONCEPTIVE

This is the interactive element of CONCEPITVES. I put out an open invitation for women to share the stages of their own cycles as a group on pinterest and twitter. During a year, which corresponds to 13 new moons, or 13 cycles in a woman's life,  I shared words and icons that reflected my internal phases. I’ve now fulfilled my commitment. The moons came and went. But I’m not done. I am still there. (13 moons was not enought !) This dialog is ongoing.

"To choose these words and images I have to maintain a continuous inquisition of where I am in my cycle, and by sharing them I invited other women to do the same. We started a weekly process of self-discovery, no matter where we were on our cycles, and because of social media, no matter where we were in the world." Come. Join us!

To find out why 13 moons was not long enough for this project. Read my blog post "13 moons".

By repurposing birth control holders I’ve accumulated over the years, I am taking control over my own cycles and reclaiming each phase my body is experiencing. At the same time, I hope to raise awareness of what we, as women, might be loosing when we interfere with our natural hormonal cycles by absorbing artificial hormones via oral contraceptive consumption."

- Jennifer Cabral

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

This self-discovery project wouldn’t have happened without the wisdom of three inspiring authors. I used their published work to guide me through my own feminine cycle awareness process. They are Christiane Northup, MD; Alisa Vitti and Sara Avant Stover.

WHITE STAINS

As we look into our past and present we are finding stains of white privilege and racism throughout our histories. It is in the core of our societies and in ourselves. It is pervasive in the arts and sciences, in our governmental institutions and private corporations.

In this work I am echoing understandings that many are exposing:

“Race is an issue in every aspect of American life, including birding, conservation, nature stewardship, and environmentalism”.

- J.Drew Lanham, PhD.

Using public domain images of the iconic artist John James Audubon as the basis of my work, I provoke others to scrutinize the symbols and legacies we praise, and to look closely at the American culture that has been handed down for generations.

Acknowledging the enormous achievements of Audubon in art and ornithology, must be accompanied by the reckoning of his practices of purchasing, selling and owning other humans. In addition to the perpetration of slavery, Audubon also relied on African Americans and Native Americans for their knowledge of the local fauna in order to execute the epitome of ornithology: “The Birds of America”. People of color were never acknowledge for their contributions. Although I am referring to distorted practices in the field of ornithology these mimic an array of so called “scientific methods” used to legitimize the erroneous concept of the existence of a superior white “race” in the first place. 

The reduction to a smaller paper size from the original double-elephant folio prints created by Audubon reflects the diminishing stature in my eyes of scientific methods that view living creatures as specimens and property. This ownership is also extended to the practice of naming birds after individuals and permanently associating species to figures from our distressing colonial past.

References:

Menakem, R. (2017). My grandmother's hands: Racialized trauma and the pathway to mending our hearts and bodies

Lanham, J. D., Contributor, & 2021, S. (2021, April 23). What Do We Do About John James Audubon?Audubon. https://www.audubon.org/magazine/spring-2021/what-do-we-do-about-john-james-audubon. 

Nobles, Gregory, Contributor, (2021, April 12). The Myth of John James Audubon. Audubon. https://www.audubon.org/news/the-myth-john-james-audubon.

Other Digitized Print Materials. Prints by John James Audubon - Digitized Materials (Rare Book and Special Collections Reading Room, Library of Congress). (n.d.). https://www.loc.gov/rr/rarebook/digitalcoll/digitalcoll-audubon.html.

Bird Names For Birds. (n.d.). https://birdnamesforbirds.wordpress.com/. 

Matthew R. Halley "Audubon's Bird of Washington: unravelling the fraud that launched The birds of America," Bulletin of the British Ornithologists’ Club, 140(2), 110-141, (22 May 2020)

Bird clock

In this art installation, a photograph is displayed along side a series of data charts representing bird observations of Twelve native species from the Northeast of the United States. these are the same 12 birds included on a KITSCHY and common wall clock which features a bird song for each hour of the day.

Initially these species were represented ON a CLOCK DIAL because of it’s wide spread presence in OUR habitat, now their display on A ticking-clock is a reminder of possible extinctions. Two-Thirds of North American Birds are estimated to be at Risk of Extinction due to Climate Change.

This work is a record of time. A moment in time. 2020. when a bird clock sang my isolation. Hour by hour.

In the context of a World Pandemic, The significant role of birds as an indicator species of climate change is intertwined with the ancient symbolism of birds as the guides of souls to the otherworld. In ancient greece they were called PSYCOPOMPS.

This artwork based on citizen-collected-scientific-data is a visual interpretation of that which one day might no longer exist, As much as it is a visual representation of those who, since 2020, are no longer with us.

They now fly.

~ dedicated to Henry and Kim.

PSyCHOPOMP psy·cho·pomp /ˈsīkōˌpämp/

noun: psychopomp; plural noun: psychopomps; noun: psychopompos; plural noun: psychopompoi

1. a guide of souls to the place of the dead.

2. the spiritual guide of a living person's soul.

Citation: "psychopomp, n." OED Online. Oxford University Press, June 2021. Web. 30 June 2021.

Technique:

“Tempera - The technique of painting with pigments bound in a water-soluble emulsion, such as water and egg yolk.”

– Art Term. Tate.

https://www.tate.org.uk/art/art-terms/t/tempera.

In this work I try to represent the collective trauma experienced during the pandemic. Instead of showing daily counts of COVID cases and deaths, I counted the presence of birds in a specific area of Mercer County, NJ. Each column represents a month of bird observations between March 2020 to February 2021, collected from one of the world’s largest biodiversity-related science projects, ebird.

I used the ancient technique, of tempera, to create the initial hues of color that represents each bird species. Using egg yokes from my favorite local sustainable farm I mixed natural organic pigments produced the same way as in ancient, medieval and Renaissance times.

After my paint strokes dried, I digitized each color to preserve various textures and tones so I could create consistent colors from month to month, to digitally generated each chart of bird observation data.

Here is a great introduction book to learn more about tempera:

Sultan, A. (1999). The Luminous Brush: Painting with Egg Tempera. United Kingdom: Watson-Guptill Publications.

Follow #birdclockdownload hashtag on Instagram

In remembrance of ______________.

These data charts are now calendars of remembrance for Those we’ve lost. For all that has changed. Free downloads. Month by month. mar 2020-feb 2021.

For those who now fly.

Click to listen each birdsong

About Charles H. Rogers

Because of his role in establishing this area as a bird sanctuary, and in recognition of his contribution to ornithology, a Wildlife Refuge in central New Jersey was dedicated to Charles H. Rogers upon his death in 1977. 

His personal bird journals were the inspiration for this art installation as well as an online exhibition I curated from the Digital Collections at Princeton University Library. 

See my first digital curation “Capturing Feathers” at https://dpul.princeton.edu/capturing_feathers

"Although I relied upon citizen collected data, this artwork is only my poetic interpretation of science.”

- Jennifer Cabral

MAKE A CHANGE.

Help fight climate change.

turn off the lights.

use less water.

take the bus.

Birds say, thank you.

References:

eBird. 2021. eBird: An online database of bird distribution and abundance. eBird, Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, New York. Available: http://www.ebird.org. (Accessed: March 20, 2020).

Bird sound recording: © Peter Boesman / Macaulay Library at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology (ML299537).

Boesman, P. (2007, February 12). Song Sparrow (heermanni Group) Macaulay Library ML296716. Song Sparrow (heermanni Group) Macaulay Library. https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/296716.

Bird sound recording: © Peter Boesman / Macaulay Library at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology (ML296716).

Boesman, P. (2017, October 23). Carolina Wren Macaulay Library ML303514. Carolina Wren Macaulay Library. https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/303514.

Bird sound recording: © Peter Boesman / Macaulay Library at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology (ML303514).

Boesman, P. (2007, February 22). Red-winged Blackbird Macaulay Library ML297099. Red-winged Blackbird Macaulay Library. https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/297099.

Bird sound recording: © Peter Boesman / Macaulay Library at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology (ML297099)

Hershberger, W. (2018, April 8). American Goldfinch Macaulay Library ML539606. American Goldfinch Macaulay Library. https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/539606.

Bird sound recording: © Wil Hershberger / Macaulay Library at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology (ML539606).

Hershberger, W. (2014, July 20). Eastern Bluebird Macaulay Library ML534749. Eastern Bluebird Macaulay Library. https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/534749.

Bird sound recording: © Wil Hershberger / Macaulay Library at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology (ML534749).

Boesman, P. (2016, June 4). Hermit Thrush Macaulay Library ML303333. Hermit Thrush Macaulay Library. https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/303333.

Bird sound recording: © Peter Boesman / Macaulay Library at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology (ML303333). 

Boesman, P. (1998, April 10). Common Yellowthroat Macaulay Library ML288195. Common Yellowthroat Macaulay Library. https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/288195.

Bird sound recording: © Peter Boesman / Macaulay Library at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology (ML288195). 

Boesman, P. (1999, April 25). Purple Martin Macaulay Library ML288472. Purple Martin Macaulay Library. https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/288472.

Bird sound recording: © Peter Boesman  / Macaulay Library at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology (ML288472). 

Boesman, P. (1999, April 15). Wood Thrush Macaulay Library ML288417. Wood Thrush Macaulay Library. https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/288417.

Bird sound recording: © Peter Boesman / Macaulay Library at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology (ML288417).

Boesman, P. (2016, June 4). Yellow Warbler (Northern) Macaulay Library ML303325. Yellow Warbler (Northern) Macaulay Library. https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/303325.

Bird sound recording: © Peter Boesman / Macaulay Library at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology (ML303325). 

Boesman, P. (2007, December 30). Summer Tanager Macaulay Library ML297434. Summer Tanager Macaulay Library. https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/297434.

Bird sound recording: © Peter Boesman / Macaulay Library at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology (ML297434).

Boesman, P. (2010, January 9). Eastern Meadowlark Macaulay Library ML299537. Eastern Meadowlark Macaulay Library. https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/299537.

Bird sound recording: © Peter Boesman / Macaulay Library at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology (ML299537).

Nov. 23rd, 2020.

TAKEN AS A GIVEN

A digital camera captured a computer screen generating double exposures of the pages of a digitized book. The pages of a physical book, the digitized pages and the re-photographed images on a computer screen are transformed into reinforcing narratives. The Assiniboine were specifically chosen on these pages to acknowledge the genocide of this First Nation not unlike the buffalo also portrayed which were almost exterminated from the North American Plains.

The tittle “Taken as a given” questions the traditional meaning of the celebration of “Thanksgiving”, and invites a re-interpretation of the collective histories experienced throughout the North American continent. In 2020 this national holiday coincided with unprecedented numbers of COVID-19 cases throughout the Continental United States.

These images are a reminder of virus outbreaks in the history of the United States. Health policies pursued by the U.S. government disproportionately exposes certain segments of American society. The portraying of Native Peoples symbolizes the disparity and inequality sustained by communities of color during the current COVID-19 virus outbreak. The high number of COVID-19 casualties and contamination among communities of color today are similar to the demise Native Nations experienced during virus outbreaks of the colonial past.

~ Dedicated to the resilience beauty and strength OF NATiVE PEOPLES.

These images are part of a series of works called I wash my hands being created by Jennifer Cabral throughout the pandemic.

DEATH MASKS

You can’t see what I say. It’s like death.

We both wear masks.

I am stone-silent. You are stone-blind.

I am echo and you are narcissus.

Based on Echo and Narcissus myth, these self-portraits depict the strain of lack of communication and the incapacity to be seen/heard.

Vowels become synonymous to gasping for air in the confused environment of self-isolation and self-protection. The poem that accompanies this series of self-portraits of the artist pronouncing each vowel, is a representation of the human essential need to be heard and seen.

Death Masks was part of the exhibition “Unique Minds: Creative Voices” curated by artist Chanika Svetvilas at Lewis Center for the Arts. For Princeton University’s Graduate Student Government’s Mental Health Initiative, from November 1 to 12, 2021.

March 1st, 2020.

I wash my hands | works created during the pandemic

As the month of March 2020 begins, the containment of the Coronavirus becomes more improbable. Many citizens throughout the world fear they are being misinformed about the scope of the outbreak of this disease. As the escalation of cases have been undergoing for weeks, governments instructed the public to protect themselves by frequently washing their hands.

Citizens trying to take responsibility for their wellbeing are doing so: “I wash my hands” gives each individual a sense of protection and permission to still interact and engage in society. “I wash my hands”, may I come in?

Meanwhile, as the inadequacy of governments’ first response to this health crisis becomes more obvious, and as the unpreparedness of nations to handle an epidemic is being revealed, “I wash my hands” also represents the governmental claims that everything possible has been done to protect world citizens - I therefore, “wash my hands”.

Governmental decisions currently underway giving priority to economic security over population safety, may one day unveil how impunity doesn’t mean immunity.

This work’s premise mimics the campaign “Duck and Cover” promoted by the Federal Civil Defense Administration agency of the United States Government during the Cold War and heightened during the “Cuban missile crisis” in the 1960s. I am recalling the collective memory of a previous attempt to sanitize and minimize impending dangers, when the population was given a false sense of security by authorities which only intended to safeguard complacency among citizens.

Various interventions and imagery involving this theme will be explored in this ongoing project. 

#iwashmyhands

March 3rd, 2020.

20 Seconds

The Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is responsible for the health security of the United States of America. On their online campaign to prevent the spread of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) the CDC offered hand-washing instructions as one of their guidelines to protect civilians from contracting the virus.

Using a text to speech app I generated an automatic recording of the “Happy Birthday” lyrics in the appropriate speed to reach the suggested lenghth of time for human disinfection according to their instructions.

This song is now appropriated for a new purpose; Although this is a communal song to be pronounced in unison in celebration of someone’s birth - it is now used as prevention against a virus, to be used in isolation during the private ritual of hand-washing. A stark reminder of the societal changes needed to be implemented during an outbreak, when human gatherings are unadvised in hopes of containment of the proliferation of a disease.

April 7th, 2020.

EXECUTIVE ORDER NO. 118

On April 7th, 2020, State Parks and Forests throughout New Jersey were closed to the public until further notice. Executive Order No. 118 took effect at 8PM in an attempt to further discourage public interactions and gatherings during the pandemic of covid-19. The United States has the most cases of infections in the world and New Jersey is only second to New York in the number of cases of the virus.

These images were taken at the last hour that access to Drexel Woods was accessible to the residents of Lawrenceville, NJ.

As it awaits for us, may the resilience of this forest stay with us.

March 5th, 2020.

UNTESTED

As of March 4, 2020 1,526 patients had been tested at CDC for Coronavirus. In 2018, the estimated population of the United States is 327.2 million people.

Reference: Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) in the U.S. (2020, March 3). Retrieved March 5, 2020, from https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/cases-in-us.html

Jennifer Cabral. Untested. (2020) Video Recording.

March 23rd, 2020.

MEMBRANES

The coronavirus is thought to spread from person-to-person mainly among those who are in close contact with one another within 6 feet. This negative space where no interaction is permitted is here represented as circumferences over a series of family photos and everyday objects.

As an immune-deficient individual, I am impeded of having contact with my family, separated by state mandates of no travel, and the fear of mutual contamination. The 6FT social Distancing becomes almost a solace: “even if we were together, we would be apart”.

An invisible sphere separates within from without. Like A cell membrane. It is a permeable space where a lack of trust of our immediate surroundings - “is it contaminated?” - is alternated with the fear of that which is beyond our immediate circle.

Household spaces, surfaces and objects become possible vectors. I PHOTOGRAPHED My IMMEDIATE environment which was once comforting and familiar and now became a foreign body. The circles serve as warnings when over objects within my reach, while when over photographs I’ve taken over the years of my family becomes an evocation for protection.

These spheres are reminders of the cellular connection between all matter and a symbolic shield of immunity, a sort of geometric spell so nothing penetrates our membranes.

#iwashmyhands

How the series “I wash my hands” started?

For weeks I had been following the events in Wuhan, China. I was in shock of the disregard of the outside world to the events that were taking place in December 2019, January and still happening in February 2020. It wasn’t going away, but spreading. I had no expertise to justify my alarm. I am no doctor, politician or prophet. I was just a human being concerned with individuals on the other side of those walls, thousands of walls, trapped inside. The death toil seemed to go hand in hand with the infringement of human rights. Basic rights.

I wanted for those around me to consider: what if that was us? What would you do? As time passed I was left with the only role I know how to play: myself. And I presented myself as someone frightened, worried and vulnerable. I would approach those around me and say: “I am really concerned. I am scared. I don’t want to get sick.” But what I didn’t tell them is that I was really concerned and scared for them, not for myself. I don’t want to get sick but I also refuse to be immune to the suffering of others.

Yes. As someone with immunodeficiency - normal post a cancer treatment, I am physically vulnerable. But mentally and emotionally I am prepared to let go of my normal life - because I once had to walk away and leave everything I knew behind. Could you do that? I hope you can.

I am sorry it is in such an abrupt and chocking way, but we all have to let go of normalcy, accommodation and convenience. And we have to step into a space and time where all that is left is what matters. What really matters to each one us. I just hope we will consider each other, each fellow human being, as the most precious thing we‘ll ever have. I wash my hands. But never of what may happen to you.

~ Jennifer Cabral

Oct. 4th, 2020.

CONTACT TRACES

“What if only that which is not virtual created my memories? What if only interactions not mediated by a device could be remembered? Which traces of contacts would remain?”

From this inquiry, artist Jennifer Cabral initiated a tracing back of each day, and a looking back at moments taking place without mediation via a digital device. In searching for tactile, palatable, audible, olfactory and visual stimuli that directly impressed her senses, a diary of sorts began. Using a blackboard and chalk, erasable and temporary traces of her quotidian started to be captured.

This process became a daily striving to identify all her close contacts (within 6 feet and at least 15 minutes or longer)* that occurred outside the digital realm. She tries to remember all non-virtual environments, very much like the process of contact tracing being adopted during this pandemic as part of containment strategies for covid-19 - identify that which a person came into contact with.

I have an invitation to make: Look back at this day. From what just happened 5 minutes ago, to the first instant you opened your eyes this morning. Which moments you have experienced today without a device in sight?

- Jen Cabral

“We have plenty of room in our lives for knowledge and data, for learning and information, amusement and entertainment, but not for wisdom.” - Peter Kingsley, In the dark places of Wisdom.

* AS AN IMMUNE-COMPROMISED INDIVIDUAL, THE ARTIST PRACTICES ALL RECOMMENDATIONS TO AVOID EXPOSURE TO COVID-19, INCLUDING SOCIAL DISTANCING, WEARING MASKS AND AVOIDING INDOOR SPACES, AS WELL AS QUARANTINING MAIL AND PACKAGES FOR AT LEAST 24 HOURS.

Contact traces is part of a series of works called I wash my hands being created by Jennifer Cabral throughout the Covid-19 pandemic.