EDGES, ENCOUNTERS, 2013 - ongoing

Edges, Encounters resembles pages of a textbook with illustrations and captions but without text.  The missing text is the missing History, a blank space to be completed.

Edges, Encounters is a project on cultural exchanges, on assimilation, representation and misappropriation.  It examines public monuments, museum collections and other sites haunted by history, by violent, lustful intercourse.

This is a series about colonialism but not only.  It is also about hybridity and the flux of identity.  Self-image is greatly constructed by others, by how one sees oneself through the eyes of others, by clashes, by mingling.  For example, a Hollywood prop, which by its very nature is a symbol of artifice, is used as a mark of authenticity by the city of Çanakkale (contemporary Troy, Turkey).

This project involves a great effort in research, resources (through grants) and travel.  It is a collection of images, of objects and experiences that narrate the extent in which contemporary society is formed by a complex and ongoing system of exchanges.  As a ‘permanent foreigner’ rather than a ‘permanent resident’ (a Brazilian who lives in the United States) I bring a particular sensibility to the whole enterprise: the eyes of the Southern hemisphere to the Northern lands, the eyes of two former colonies (Brazil and the U.S.) to Europe.

This work is about rich (if often violent) exchanges, of a two-way highway of ideas, customs, and worldviews.