Print on paper, and metal
2,5m x 1,5m
2018
The project starts from a collection of photograms of the films produced by the US government about Brazil during the Cold War, by the Office of Inter-American Affairs. These films constituted educational material that presented Brazil to the North American public in school and cultural contexts, with the pretext of promoting understanding and friendship on the continent. However, despite the celebratory phrases and texts, the images in these films have strong ideological content, portraying Brazil as a territory for the exploitation of natural resources and labor.
From the appropriation, disassembly, and reassembly of these films, a photographic mural is built. Through the decoupage of the scenes, the work reorganizes the images by categories of commodities – “land”, “grains”, “labor-force”, “minerals”, “architecture”, “stones” -, raw goods, produced on a large scale, destined for export. Relating space, economy, and culture, the work proposes to review the image and imaginaries constructed of the territory.
Appropriating pedagogical material, the project proposes an inversion, a detour, in which the past and the present mix, and culture and domination are articulated.
[the work is part of the long-term project “Brasil Brazil”]
