Quando a imagem é corpo: modos de sobreviver à máquina colonial

Abstract

Having as a starting point the human remains of an African slave buried in Rio de Janeiro’s harbour and the film “Era o Hotel Cambridge” (Brazil, 2016), about a squat in downtown Sao Paulo, we will discuss how an image configures a body in extreme situations. We aim to observe the intermittent emergence of images and what is considered rest, trail and remains of colonial power structures. From human bones that claim reparation from their slave past, to the skeleton of an abandoned building reinvented as political body by refugees and Brazilian homeless, image is the instance that carries political demands in time. It is the insistence of a marginalized and violated memory that refuses to be erased. As a gesture of creation, persistence and re-existence, image becomes an analytical tool to understand postcolonial contexts and its surviving remains.