ORIGEM: Fykyá and Bia Pankararu discuss queer identities in Brazil and their role in Liquid Gender
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Afro-indigenous photographer Laryssa Machada and Indigenous creative Antônio Vital Neto Pankararu document queer Indigenous identities in the Brazilian Northeast in ORIGEM (2020).
The result of a research project at the University of Leeds, it draws on centuries of both visibility and oppression of queer people in Brazil and is on display in Liquid Gender.
Two of the subjects of the photographs, Fykyá and Bia Pankararu, came to visit the work on display. They spoke about the experience of being involved in the project and being queer in Brazil.
“Living in Brazil, in Brazil, in the Caatinga, in the hinterland, there is this process of tripled resistance, when you are indigenous LGBTQ+, because mainly in the hinterland there is the structure of the macho. So, when you are a man, you are born with certain obligations to represent this masculinity, which is expected of men from the hinterland.
“And it is also expected of women from the hinterland, that subservience, that submission of women before the father, before the brother, before the husband. And when we rise up to break with that, in some movements it ends up being a little exhausting for us, but also ends up being very transformative, both for us and for those around us.
“So, today we are here, doing what we do, presenting what we present with our work, from the margins and from the conditions for others like us to see that it is possible. That it is possible to live as one lives, it is possible to live your sexuality, live your love, live your life, because in truth it is a great struggle for us to live in peace.”
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