A testimony of poisoned women in the Amazon region

Gabriel Carneiro da Cunha, a rising voice in the international theatre world, pursues a profound artistic research into the polluted waters of her homeland Brazil and the women who live on the banks of the Tapajos. They work hard for a healing of their bodies, wombs, children and river.

“The same chemicals that are used for analogous photography can kill a river.”

Tapajos originated from meetings with mothers who got poisoned by the mercury in the Tapajos river in the Amazon region, coming from illegal mining activity. The project grew into an alliance of mothers : the Munduruku-mothers, the fish mother, the wood mother, the river mother, and eventually also the mothers in the audience. Using water basins and chemicals to develop analogous photos, and with the help of the audience, Da Cunha creates a performance about river water, pollution and photography as a testimony.

Gabriela Carneiro da Cunha is a Brazilian actress, director and researcher. Since 2013, she has developed the “Riverbanks Project : about rivers, buiunas and fireflies”, an artistic research project in which the Brazilian rivers that are impacted through human agency are at the center.

The first phase was executed in 2015, after listening to the testimony of the Araguaia river about the women who fought in the Araguaia Guerrilla. In this phase she created Guerrillas Or To Earth There Are No Missing Persons (2015) and the film Edna (released in 2021) The second phase of the research led to the performance Altamira 2042 (2019), a testimony of the Xingu river about the catastrophy caused by the Belo Monte hydro-electric power station. In this third phase everything centres around the river Tapajos.

22.11 - 20:00
Le méliès Villeneuve d'Ascq
La chute du ciel - Gabriela Carneiro Da Cunha

Brazilian multidisciplinary artist Gabriela Carneiro da Cunha, who is very active in the Amazon, has also made a documentary film with Eryk Rocha, inspired by the eponymous book by Yanomami shaman Davi Kopenawa and anthropologist Bruce Albert: La Chute du Ciel.