Leonardo Carrato
VII Photo
Rio de Janeiro, State of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
I was born in Minas Gerais on march 4th, 1983, in a small town by the name of Juiz de Fora. Tough as it is being from a country home, only in mid-2012 I could really throw myself into a journey driven by my biggest passion: photography. Nowadays, settled in Rio de Janeiro, I work as an independent photographer and movie maker.
During the troubled year of 2013 and at that time, I was able to carry out three really important projects. The first, called "O Levante” began during the popular protests that drove millions of people into the streets of the country to demand social improvements and an end to corruption. With this project, I joined several independent media groups and was able to publish much of the images in magazines, websites and newspapers. In addition, I held several exhibitions throughout the country, with the festivals in Paraty and Cape Verde being the main platforms.
In 2014, with the imminent realization of the great events like World Cup and Olympics, I felt the need to understand better the core of the social problems of the city of Rio de Janeiro. Throughout the year, I documented the situation of hundreds of families occupying a building in the Mangueira favela, a few meters away from Maracanã. With this work called "Article 6 - We Do Not Want to Turn Statistic" I achieved important visibility in the mainstream media and got a scholarship from one of the masters of photography, the Italian Ernesto Bazan.
During a trip, in mid-2015, photographing and traveling the entire length of the Amazon River, I met Aladino. He is a healer and along with him and his family I started the project that I am working to this moment. Another meeting on this journey was with the women shamans of the Island of Marajó in Brazil. In this curative practice where they are rare, these women are considered more powerful than the male shamans. Given the peculiarity of the story, in March 2017, I had the opportunity to return to the scene and shoot a short film.
- Arts
- Breaking news
- Conflict
- Editorial
- Environment
- Interview
- Landscape
- Portrait
- Video capture
- Wildlife
