Galeria Claudia Andujar
Galeria Claudia Andujar features a collection of more than 500 photographs selected from the artist's archive, which convey the history of her long involvement with the Brazilian Amazon and the Yanomami indigenous people, inhabitants of the Brazilian states of Roraima and Amazonas and of Venezuela. Divided into segments, in a gallery designed for and permanently dedicated to this end, the exhibition of images is organized according to three main themes.
The section entitled "The Land" features landscape photographs made in different parts of the Amazonian territory; "The Man" records the traditional life of the Yanomami, with an emphasis on shamanic rituals, everyday life in the home and in the forest, and a set of portraits; while "The Conflict" shows different fronts of contact between the Yanomami and white men, a process that led to Andujar's engagement in fighting for the indigenous cause and their right to land and culture. Andujar's unique work combines authorial photography, her learning about indigenous culture, and her humanitarian and political activism. The images were selected through a five-year-long collaborative research and curatorial process between the institution and the artist. A great part of these pictures has never been shown before. They were selected, organized and printed for the first time for the Gallery's inaugural exhibition.
Lavrado [Plowed], 1972Internal Territories series, analog photography - digital output print on photographic paper
State of Roraima
Igapó, 1970-71
Amazonian River, State of Amazonas
Mourera aspera, 1971-72San Antônio Waterfall, Jari River, State of Amapá
Yanomami - The Human Being
In 1971, Andujar left the photojournalism to devote herself to a grand authorial project. She began to work on a long photographic essay that documented the traditional life of the Yanomami. This work lasted until 1977, when she was expelled from the indigenous area by the government. The artist's aim was to register a recently contacted population, threatened by the quickening pace of the military government's plans to penetrate the Amazonian territory. Yanomami is an ethnonym (a name given to an ethnic group) adopted by the anthropologists which means human being as opposed to napëpë, which means foreigners. Learning the indigenous culture was essential for Andujar's work. In this room, we see pictures of life in the community house (shabono) and in the forest-land (urihi), and many of them depict the reahu, a big festive ceremony that involves various communities, their funerals, foods, dancing, hugs, and trances led by the hallucinogen yakoana.The photographs convey this learning through the use of light, which symbolizes the spirits (xapiripe) evoked by the shamans. The installation of these works in a gallery with natural lighting was conceived as a field diary of this fundamental moment for the artist's work. In Andujar's words: "my work has not yet found its definitive form, which I actually believe does not exist. Like the myths, it is constantly adapting, incorporating new images, and taking new forms".
Copyright © Tara Luty 2024