Miguel Rio Branco | Magnum Photos People of the Gorotire, Kayapó, near the Seco River.
Pará, Brazil. 1992.
“In 1983, being somehow part of a society within a country still seeking its personality, a country of gigantic contras
(...) ts, I was looking to do a piece with those who were in this land before the arrival of the Portuguese. I had been looking for an indigenous tribe for several years without success when I got to the gold diggers area of Cumaru. I arrived there broke, but was invited by the two Kayapó chiefs, Kanhoc and Totoi, to come to their turtle festival that happens every 5 years. Not only did this experience bring me surprising material, but it also changed the direction of my use of photography; that same year after my second trip through the support of National Geographic, I switched to a more dynamic use of images. ‘Dialogues with Amaú’ came as a result, an installation in the 1983 São Paulo Biennale.
Later, in 1992, with a journalist friend from Stern, Rainer Fabian, we were invited by Kanhoc to return to the village. The idea was to illuminate not only the changes in the village but also those in my creative approach to the subject. Things did not go as well as the magical trip years before. … Still, their portrait was able to be made with this great parallel between male and female, the future warrior and his generous mother.”
- Miguel Rio Branco © Miguel Rio Branco | Magnum Photos
