Aîkugûabeté focuses on documenting the environments of the Amazonas state in Brazil through observational photography and audio recordings. I represent Aîkugûabeté both as a publication and as a physical exhibition for the YIRRAMBOI festival. Brazil is often positioned in a romanticized light that is cast upon the darker realities of the country by photographic artists. The Amazon is equally misrepresented as an isolated land with untouched tribes, and Aîkugûabeté aims to provide truth-telling narratives through sharing traditional stories, known as ‘lendas’. It is important to represent Brazil as a highly diverse country both in terms of its demographics but also in history, culture, and landscapes. Aîkugûabeté decolonises representations of Brazil through educating viewers of the traditional stories of these environments known in Brazil. I share these stories through various recorded monologues where the audience can listen with headphones or speakers accompanying the photograph. Aîkugûabeté is the Tupi language for the Portuguese expression, ‘sou muito grato’. Sou muito grato translates to ‘I’m very grateful’ in English. The publication contains short stories and poems written by Amanda Nascimento, an artist of the Tupinambá people in North East Brazil. In this publication, we have developed a Tupi to Portuguese dictionary. Tupi is one of the two largest Indigenous language groups in Brazil, and also a threatened language, where its written documentation is almost extinct. The focus of this project is to materialise and preserve a part of Indigenous Brazilian culture and language, which is continuously being threatened by colonisation and neo-liberalism.

Exhibited at Testing Grounds 13th May-21st May. 

3 audio recordings accessed via QR codes.

16 framed archival inkjet prints

56 page, PUR bound, publication.

Part of the 2021 YIRRAMBOI festival program.