In Brazil, museums are striving to preserve the heritage of Indigenous peoples

In the spotlight in the run-up to the country's presidential election, Brazil's influence keeps expanding in many fields. When it comes to the country's many Indigenous peoples, their future has been most uncertain since the arrival in power of Jair Bolsonaro. Now, museums in Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo are fighting against their demise by affording Indigenous peoples visibility in a tangible and respectful way.

The bicentenary of Brazil's independence is an opportunity for the largest country in South America to look back at its history, and in particular, that of its Indigenous peoples. It is estimated that they now represent just 0.4% of the Brazilian population, as a result of decades of anti-indigenous policies.

Their survival has been particularly threatened since the 2018 election of Jair Bolsonaro. The far-right president maintains a colonialist vision, borrowed from the military dictatorship, according to which the "Indian" is supposed to assimilate, to become "just like any other Brazilian." "We are going to integrate them into society. Just like the army which did a great job of this, incorporating the Indians into the armed forces," he said two months before his election.

From this perspective, Jair Bolsonaro's government is working to eradicate Indigenous culture and rituals from Brazil's collective memory. He has appointed Marcelo Augusto Xavier da Silva, a former federal police officer with close ties to the powerful agribusiness lobby, to head the National Indian Foundation (FUNAI). This public organization is responsible for "protecting and promoting the rights" of Brazil's Indigenous peoples, and has as its showcase the Museu do Índio, or the Museum of the Indian, in Rio de Janeiro.

Remembrance and resistance

This 69-year-old institution houses more than 20,000 objects, historical documents and ethnographic publications, recording the life and customs of the Ondigenous community. Unfortunately, it has been closed to the public since 2016, in order to carry out renovations necessary to improve the building's fire safety. Administrators of the Museum of the Indian say that these renovations are well underway and that the facility will begin to reopen from as soon as the second half of 2023. Much of the museum's collection is currently available online to allow Brazilians to learn about this part of their national heritage.

Although very long, this closure has provided an opportunity to invite Indigenous groups to visit the museum. The goal? To help with the conservation and cataloging of the objects that it houses, according to The Art Newspaper. "It is very important that we begin to transfer the responsibilities of preserving and disseminating the cultures to the indigenous peoples themselves," the museum's director, Giovani Souza Filho, told the specialist publication.

Meanwhile, protecting the ways of life of Indigenous peoples is the mission of the new Museu das Culturas Indígenas (Museum of Indigenous Cultures) in São Paulo. The 1,400 sq m building, which opened on June 30, currently houses three temporary exhibitions. Two of them are dedicated to the artists Denilson Baniwa and Xadalu Tupã Jekupé, whose works address the themes of displacement and colonialism through various media. The third show, entitled "Ocupação Decoloniza," gathers a series of murals and graffiti with motifs from the Guaraní culture.

This eclectic program reflects the museum's desire to become "a space for intercultural dialogue, plurality, encounters between Indigenous and non-indigenous peoples, where the memory of ancestry will allow the various native peoples to share their messages, ideas, knowledge, philosophies, music, arts and stories." Their survival depends on it in a Brazilian nation facing great uncertainty one month ahead of the first round of the presidential election.