Vera Cruz

"Vera Cruz was conceived as an impossible documentary. The conversations that make up the video’s subtitles are based on the contents of the letter written by Pero Vaz de Caminha to King Manuel I, the Fortunate, in which he recounted the first 10 days spent on Brazilian shore, as of the ‘discovery’ of Brazil, in 1500. I tried not to let any of the details described in the letter slip by, hence the video’s medium length: it lasts 44 minutes. The only dialogue other than what is reported in the letter concerns the actual sailing. It was created with help from a sailor and uses nautical terms.
 
It was my first video work ever, and I proceeded thus because it seemed to me then like the only way to deal with the contents of Caminha’s letter. The piece was commissioned for a group exhibition of re-readings of that letter. It was created in response to the celebrations of the 500th anniversary of our discovery, using as much humor as I could muster. It was the only video piece in the exhibition, and as such it was not well received by the curators. Like a few others, this piece was only understood some time later.

History is always anchored on documents, and images are an integral, important part of them. However, any investigation based on ancient documents and remainders from a time past is bound to contain gaps. Is not history constantly being revisited and expanded? It could not be otherwise in our vast American continent where Europeans have always tried to minimize the importance of all things pre-Colombian. What happens is that often, institutions and the powers take advantage of the shortcomings and gaps in order to rewrite or edit history based on specific agendas, and this is exactly what must become the object of observation, research and even denunciation.
 
The video Vera Cruz has been shown at several international exhibitions, among them one titled Nous venons en paix — Histoires des Amériques, at the Montreal Museum of Contemporary Art, Canada, whose curator Pierre Landry was addressing precisely the questioning and reinvention of our approach towards History, through the artwork of artists from Latin American and North American countries. Some of my work contains reflections on this subject, such as Vera Cruz, Cicatriz (photos of tattoos and heads from the São Paulo State Penitentiary Museum collection), Imemorial, Candelária, Cartologia, the books about the National Library thefts and the General Archive of the City of Rio de Janeiro."

Rosângela Rennó in a statement to PLATFORM:VB (August 2014)