Esgotados
Elsa Leydier
In February 2014, the Brazilian Post Office printed 600,000 stamps dedicated to the World Cup. In a few days, all of the 600,000 stamps had sold out on the internet and in stores.
In Rio de Janeiro, near the Maracanã stadium, where most of the World Cup games were played in Summer 2014, is the Antigo Museu do Índio. This is the country’s only site dedicated to indigenous culture, and it has been occupied by different Indian communities for years. In March 2013, after months of struggle, the Indians were violently removed from the museum by the military police. It was done to make way for a complex of restaurants, parking lots and stores filled with products related to the 2014 World Cup.
Today, after the end of the Worldcup, the Antigo Museu do Indio was able to escape from demolition, but it is barricaded and under the control of Government ; Indians have no right to access the place.
Postcards, stamps.
Plátanos con platino (Platinum bananas)
Elsa Leydier
Chocó is the poorest region in Colombia. It is very isolated geographically from the rest of the Colombian territory, abandoned by the government, and the statistics, in addition to raising its alarming rates of poverty, rank it in the list of the most violent areas in the country. All these facts appear commonly in the pages of the newspapers when the latter deign to mention Chocó. But, though this is less often mentioned in the media, Chocó is the richest region in Colombia and one of the richest in the world in terms of its biodiversity.
This work is first a reflection on the way one can play with the image with which one reports on a territory, from which one can construct and use the narratives. But it is also a way of revealing Chocó by approaching it from a side less visible and often neglected to the advantage of another dominant and omnipresent representation. It is an attempt to rise up against the bad news, to bring into light more positive and optimistic narratives.
Plátanos con platino (Platinum bananas)
Elsa Leydier
Chocó is the poorest region in Colombia. It is very isolated geographically from the rest of the Colombian territory, abandoned by the government, and the statistics, in addition to raising its alarming rates of poverty, rank it in the list of the most violent areas in the country. All these facts appear commonly in the pages of the newspapers when the latter deign to mention Chocó. But, though this is less often mentioned in the media, Chocó is the richest region in Colombia and one of the richest in the world in terms of its biodiversity.
This work is first a reflection on the way one can play with the image with which one reports on a territory, from which one can construct and use the narratives. But it is also a way of revealing Chocó by approaching it from a side less visible and often neglected to the advantage of another dominant and omnipresent representation. It is an attempt to rise up against the bad news, to bring into light more positive and optimistic narratives.