Associação Cultural Videobrasil

The trophy to the 22nd Biennial Sesc_Videobrasil is the work Matapi, by artist Denilson Baniwa, whose title comes from an indigenous fish trap which is placed in the mouth or narrowest area of a river or lake. It catches fish according to its weft: if wider, it catches larger fish and lets medium-sized ones pass through. If more tightly closed, it catches smaller fish in larger quantities. According to the artist, drawing on this image and on the idea of memory as an editing station, the piece was created to represent the intention of the person behind the lens, and the lens itself, in capturing images. Denilson began by researching things that could be related to memory, to editing, but also to his object of work—indigenous issues. He imagined the matapi as a metaphor for capture, for what filters, what comes out and what remains—as in actual editing—and what later serves us as food: in the case of the matapi, fish; in the case of the image, the result of the film.

The biennial's trophies are unique pieces created by renowned Brazilian artists in dialogue with the curatorial proposal for each edition. Pieces by the artists Alexandre da Cunha, Carmela Gross, Efrain Almeida, Erika Verzutti, Flavia Ribeiro, Luiz Zerbini, Tunga, Raquel Garbelotti and Rosângela Rennó make up the Biennial's trophy collection since its thirteenth edition.

On the occasion of the 40th anniversary of Video Brasil, we acknowledge and celebrate the aspiration, commitment, and resolve of Solange Farkas, the fearless and intrepid founder and director, and her hardworking team, to foster the dynamism vídeo practice in Brazil and the Global South. We want to commend the curators, Raphael Fonseca and Renee Akitelek Mboya, for creating conditions for an interdisciplinary context of the works in relation to the sócio-economic environment in the world. In these times of relentless crisis, VB has continued to be a space for imagination, resistance, and propositions for the future coming out of multiple and continuing wars.

The works in the Biennale express and demonstrate the diversity of forms, the courage of artists to speak to the complexity of the issues they confront, and to face the difficult concerns of society like migration, ecology, oppression, colonization. We strongly support the articulation of materials and the dialogue between them, from ritual objects to digital technlogy. The selected works embody these strengths as revealed in the way they Interact across experiences and geographies.