Brazilian Cultural Institutions Embrace Indigenous Art and Perspectives Amid Environmental and Political Crisis

Major Brazilian cultural institutions are increasingly focusing on Indigenous art, production, and worldviews, presenting a counterpoint to the escalating environmental destruction and political threats facing Indigenous peoples. This movement includes exhibitions at Sesc, Museu Afro Brasil, Pinacoteca, MASP, and Instituto Moreira Salles, among others. The MASP has hired Sandra Benites, a Guarani Nhandewa anthropologist, as its first Indigenous curator, while the Pinacoteca invited Terena artist and researcher Naine Terena to curate a show. Key exhibitions include 'Véxoa' at the Pinacoteca, 'Histórias Indígenas' as MASP's 2021 curatorial axis, and 'Heranças de um Brasil Profundo' at Museu Afro Brasil. Anthropologist Sylvia Caiuby Novaes notes that Amerindian peoples do not separate ethics, aesthetics, and morality. Artist Denilson Baniwa and leader Ailton Krenak emphasize Indigenous resistance and knowledge. The trend involves direct dialogue with Indigenous communities, avoiding folklorization, and challenges the stereotype of Indigenous peoples as part of the past. It emerges against a backdrop of record deforestation, land invasions, and the highest number of Indigenous leadership murders in a decade in 2019.