Reflections

The human being from the beginning has always sought belonging. Belonging, identifying with a group, is essential to our survival.

With immigrants, it's no different. One of the many struggles we face as immigrants is not being able to see ourselves in the eyes of the people we live with. Transiting the streets, looking at faces, clothes, small gestures, objects and the like and not recognizing ourselves in them causes us great insecurity. We need a connection, a form of recognition, for the creation of self-confidence and the ability to live.

In this series, composed of paintings, installation, and performance, I create a portrait of community that reflects a part of my self, but also a little of this strangeness that is lived as a Brazilian immigrant in the US. This collection plays with all that I have accumulated in my journey for belonging, and that is still revealed daily in my life. The works will have images of Brazilians in their daily gestures, clothes, and peculiarities, revealing a space, a collective, where I find self, and that I call “belonging."

I am, we all are, reflections of my communities.