In a statement given on occasion of her participation in the show Unerasable Memories – a historic look at the videobrasil collection, Rosângela Rennó discusses Vera Cruz (2000), which was shown and awarded a prize at the 13th Festival (2001). The artist defines her first video work as an “impossible documentary” about the arrival of the Portuguese in Brazil. In Vera Cruz, all that is supposedly left in the documentation is the sounds of the wind and sea and the subtitles. What contents would the footage contain had it remained intact? The spectators fill the gaps in sound and image with their own versions. Vera Cruz is based upon and reinterprets the letter sent by Pero Vaz de Caminha to the King of Portugal. The historical document the artist studied in her childhood has attracted her anew with its in-depth descriptions containing mischievous elements. As Rennó reveals, the worn-out footage in Vera Cruz was created by applying telecining to the edges of film strips.
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