Anais do Museu Paulista: História e Cultura Material
Publish theoretical and monographic articles that are based on social practices mediated by materiality and addressed as historical, museological, and conservation issues.
Universidade de São Paulo. Museu Paulista
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Copyright (c) 2025 David William Aparecido Ribeiro, Maria Aparecida de Menezes Borrego https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
The preservation of Brasília’s cultural heritage: institutional action and processes at the district level
Since 1975, the Federal District has had a body dedicated to the preservation of local cultural heritage, linked to its Secretariat of Culture. This text analyzes its little-known trajectory and local heritage management systems, highlighting actions, challenges and structural changes. The research, based on specific bibliography and the analysis of organograms from the Secretariat, demonstrates that the agency’s performance – initially called the Divisão do Patrimônio Histórico e Artístico and now corresponding to the Subsecretaria do Patrimônio Cultural (SUPAC) – peaked in the 1980s. This period, characterized by significant technical management, valuable partnerships, and the prestige gained from the studies that culminated in Brasilia’s recognition as a World Heritage Site by Unesco, further solidified the image of the city’s cultural heritage. However, from the 1990s onwards, a clear decrease in the institutional importance is identified, marked by successive reorganizations, loss of autonomy, and a reduction in its responsibilities, despite a relative stability in the pace of heritage listings. Finally, the preservation policies implemented, which aimed both to reinforce the modernist monumental image of the Plano Piloto and to incorporate complementary narratives about the workers and the pre-existing history, are contextualized here as part of the trajectory of the heritage institution.
Copyright (c) 2026 Daniela Pereira Barbosa https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Paratexts and Paratextuality in the Early Modern Period: Thresholds, Functions, and Transformations
Titles, prefaces, tables of contents, epigraphs, and dedications exemplify paratexts, systematically analyzed by Gérard Genette in the 1980s based on 19th- and 20th-century literary works. This study revisits foundational definitions, reviews recent developments in the study of paratexts in the Early Modern period, and proposes a methodological framework for their analysis. Its first section examines expressions by pre-20th-century authors of an awareness regarding the distinctive nature of elements surrounding a printed text and reassess Genette’s contribution. The second addresses three themes not explicitly developed by the French scholar: the unstable nature of authorship, the proliferation of elements within the body of the text endowed with paratextual value, and the expression of this value in non-textual manifestations, such as maps and illustrations. The third introduces two alternative approaches to the study of paratexts: the material construction of printed books in the Early Modern period and the agents responsible for it and the rhetorical dimension of proemial matter. Finally, we articulate a methodological proposal that foregrounds the paratextual value — or paratextuality — of any constitutive element of a historical document, as expressed across its material, performative, and functional dimensions, each of which is simultaneously a sign and a product of the societies that generated it. Emphasizing paratextualityoffers a pathway into the processes of document production and circulation, sociabilities among involved agents, mechanisms of knowledge-making, ideological, political, and religious disputes, networks of loyalty and conflict, modes of apprehension and appropriation of groups, and spacesacross discourse, economic relations, and the technical possibilities of the time.
Copyright (c) 2025 Andréa Doré, André de Melo Araújo, Thomás A. S. Haddad, Verônica Calsoni Lima, Luís Filipe Silvério Lima https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Archive in dispute: a semantic genealogy of Sérgio Buarque de Holanda’s estate
The article examines the construction of the memory and bibliography of Sérgio Buarque de Holanda, focusing on the organization and destination of his personal archive and library after his death in 1982. The historian’s personal archive and library were sold to the State University of Campinas (Unicamp), which played a central role in preserving his legacy. The text explores the institutional disputes and key figures involved in this process, highlighting the roles of Maria Amélia Buarque de Holanda and Antonio Candido de Mello e Souza in shaping and controlling the historian’s image. The analysis addresses three distinct temporalities in the interpretation of his work: the consolidation of Buarque’s image as an intellectual and essayist in the 1960s; the formalization of his memory after his death in the 1980s; and finally, the critical reassessments of his work from the 1990s onward, when new academics and institutions began to redefine the uses of his archive and his historical significance.
Copyright (c) 2025 Luccas Eduardo Maldonado, Thiago Lima Nicodemo https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Routes of the Bell of São Miguel Marangatu: Decolonial subsidies for documentation of the Museum of the Missions
This study investigates the biography and museum route of the Bell of São Miguel, currently exhibited on the porch of the Museum of the Missions to resignify the knowledge about it and revise its documentary file offered to the public by the documentary system of the museum, the Tainacan. Although now considered by the Museum as a Christian and Jesuit object, this study understands the Bell as a work that, via historical research, can have an itinerary of almost 300 years reconstructed as an indigenous heritage integrated into the collection of a public museum. For this, this study has five sections that document the life of the bell from its foundry in 1726 to the present day in which, defunctionalized as a museological object, it is permeated with interpretations that tension ethnocentric visions and indigenous epistemology. Finally, in possession of the museum route of the Bell, this study elaborates an analysis of the records of the documentary system of the Museum of the Missions to propose documentation based on decoloniality.
Copyright (c) 2025 Jean Tiago Baptista, Zita Rosane Possamai, Ana Karina Calmon, Diego Vivian, Tony Boita, Filipe Gomes de Pompeu https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Rui Barbosa Museum of the Faculty of Law of Recife: from choosing a name to building a memory
This article investigates the founding process of the Rui Barbosa Museum of the Recife Law School, founded on May 13, 1927, with documents and personal objects of the jurist, donated by Ulysses Brandão. At that time, the academy already had the Recife Law School Museum, created in 1922 by director Netto Campello, with an iconographic collection representing the historical trajectory of the Law School. The political and social transformations that culminated inthe Revolution of Thirty and the Estado Novo (1945) directly affected the School, both politically, culturally, and administratively, with reforms and changes that led to losses in museum collections. It is estimated that the museums merged in the 1950s. During the 1980s, the space was restored andreopened under the name: Rui Barbosa Museum. The lack of records of the collection incorporation process and criteria for choosing the name led to the erasure of the 1922 Museum and raised questions: Why wasn’t the Rui Barbosa collection incorporated into the existing Museum? How did the merger of the museums and the prevalence of the name Rui Barbosa Museum occur? The objective of this article is to suggest possible answers to these questions. The research included a bibliographic and documentary survey. The analyses were based on Maurice Halbwachs’s theoretical perspective of Collective Memory and subjected to the criteria suggested by Pollak. It was observed that the choice of the name Rui Barbosa Museum was a notably symbolic political choice in the construction of the institutional memory of the Recife Law School.
Copyright (c) 2026 Lígia Santos da Silva Rodrigues, Murilo Artur Araújo da Silveira https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Narratives of educators in a distance learning course on disinformation in Astronomy offered by a Science Museum
Disinformation, as a contemporary socio-technical phenomenon, have become one of the most concerning challenges to be faced. Museums and their professionals are also included in this context, both as targets of fake news and as promoters of debates and research on the subject. This article presents and discusses some experiences from the first edition of the course ‘Fake News e Verificação de Fatos em Astronomia e Ciências Afins’, offered by the Coordination of Science Education at the Museum of Astronomy and Related Sciences (COEDU/MAST). We interpreted the narratives of mediators-teachers and course participants, discussing some initial findings on the formative experiences and the multiple ‘knowledge-meanings’ emerging during the course, as well as raising reflections on the need for adjustments to improve future editions. We highlight the emergence of the following findings: (a) the importance of training for education in/with cyberculture; (b) social networks as the main source of information accessed by course participants and the necessary training to deal with the information they receive and access through them; (c) the concern of course participants about misinformation in the field of astronomy; (d) the concern of some course participants with regards to the training of young people for factchecking; (e) the emergence of different types of disinformation grammars in astronomy content discussed during the course (e.g. sensationalism, conspiratorial tone, selectivity), which led us to rename the course and also to adopt the concept proposed by Recuero.
Copyright (c) 2025 Frieda Maria Marti, Wallace Carriço de Almeida, Patrícia Figueiró Spinelli https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
First architecture biennials in Chile: hidden agenda in the face of Pinochet's urban policies, 1976-1985
Conceived by the College of Architects of Chile to stimulate local production and dialogue between architects and society, the first Chilean Architecture Biennial took place in 1977, just four years after Pinochet's coup. Held uninterruptedly since then, the review of its initial period generally highlighted the aspect of openness to international debate that these exhibitions allowed for local architectural and urban culture. It is intended to demonstrate that the first Chilean Biennials were also a place to defend the professional performance of architects in general and, particularly, regarding urban issues. In context of military intervention and dismantling of urban and regional planning institutions established since Frei's government (1965-1970), the biennials provided a place in which it was possible to debate urbanism, social housing and defense of the architect's position in relation to these. To this end, we will first seek to situate the first five Chilean biennials (1977-1985) as a piece of resistance amid the crossroads between the weakening of urban and regional planning institutions, the oscillation of urban policies and the depreciation of regulatory professional bodies. Next, it will be demonstrated how issues pertinent to urban planning practiced by architects, urban heritage and social housing were present in these biennials.
Copyright (c) 2025 Gisela Barcellos de Souza https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Local elites, social domination and invisibilities: the construction of official memory at the Municipal Historical Museum of Palmas (PR)
Museums are institutions authorized to produce and project “legitimate” representations of the past, social groups, and historical characters. This study analyzes the process of construction and representation of official memory at the Professor José Alexandre Vieira Municipal Historical Museum, created in 1979 in the municipality of Palmas (PR). This study analyzes the official representation of the contribution of several social groups — ethnic-racial groups, families, ruling political class, economic segments, etc. — to the socio-historical formation of the municipality, the place they occupy in the museum space, and the relevance for local history they acquire in the narrative conveyed by the museum. This study analyzed the expographic narrative of the museum, reconstructing it by ethnographic incursions into the exhibition route, and carried out a documentary research in the historical archive available at the institution. This research found that the Palmas Museum fits as a symbolic investment strategy that operates as a mechanism for reproducing the domination of local elites who mobilize memory as a resource to symbolically reproduce their social domination, by the social consecration of great families and the election of great characters who compose the historical pantheon of the municipality. The social reproduction of local elites and relationships of domination in the universe of memory and the symbolic imply the invisibility and erasure of social groups that have been historically dominated in the local context, especially Indigenous groups and populations of African origin.
Copyright (c) 2025 Lucas Voigt, Luiz Fernando Rankel https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
This article reflects on ethnographic theories and critical counterpoints to Western regimes of control and classification regarding the “things of others”. The article recovers Western conceptions of thing and object, in view of their incompatibility with ontological assumptions derived from indigenous societies of the South American lowlands. Marked by the association between thing, body, person and kinship, these assumptions come into direct conflict with modern forms of institutionalization and their constitutive silencing of other forms of existence.
Copyright (c) 2026 Pedro de Niemeyer Cesarino, Lucas da Costa Maciel https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Representations of the slavery past in the Museu Imperial: “Um Sarau Imperial” and “Espetáculo Som e Luz”
This article aims to analyze the representations of the slavery past in Um Sarau Imperial and Espetáculo Som e Luz, productions that took place at the Museu Imperial, in the city of Petrópolis. They were created in the early 2000s and, basing themselves on historical events involving members of the Imperial family, they wanted to debate political, economic, social, and cultural issues of 19th century society. The narratives about the Imperial past present on both productions were highly connected to the writing of History that would value “great events” and “important figures”, which took root and spread in Petrópolis through the network of those nostalgic for the Empire in the late 1930s and early 1940s. In Um Sarau Imperial and Espetáculo Som e Luz, the image that was constructed of the Imperial Family, particularly that of Princess Isabel and D. Pedro II, portrayed them as kind, modern, and against slavery. Both productions only discuss the topic of slavery tangentially, as to connect its end to the actions of Princess Isabel, mainly, and of the members of the abolitionist movement. In doing so, they disregard the agency that slaves and freemen had around the time slavery was abolished. This approach is a consequence of debates that were being had in the field of Historiography decades before the premiere of Um Sarau Imperial and Espetáculo Som e Luz. By adopting a decolonial perspective, we seek to analyze how both productions contribute to reiterate a nostalgic and positive portrayal of the brazilian imperial past.
Copyright (c) 2026 Jamile da Silva Neto https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
here the Rivers Meet: Landscapes of Mauritsstad and New Amsterdam
In the 17th century, the Dutch West India Company (WIC) of the Republic of the Seven Provinces, now the Netherlands, founded several overseas settlements that later became major cities; among them Recife (Mauritsstad from 1637 to 1654) and New York (New Amsterdam from 1624 to 1661). Despite similarities, such as the presence of WIC as entrepreneur, their colonial function, and the importance of the Jewish community, these municipalities have yet to be closely examined for their visual and formal similarities and contrasts. By considering the concept of landscape within the framework of the social history of the Seven Provinces and their New World colonies, we propose a comparative approach based on the analysis and discussion of iconographic sources, our primary materials. Maps, paintings, and engravings are examined for their compositional arrangement, the elements they include (or omit), and the perspectives of traveling artists. By critically engaging with these representations, we discuss how these urban centers were constructed according to the cultural and subjective criteria that shaped them, highlighting the connections between the two municipalities within a unified historical narrative.
Copyright (c) 2025 Leonardo Nóbrega, Ricardo Trevisan https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
From history museums to contemporary histories museums (Argentina, second half of the 20th century)
From history museums to contemporary histories museums (Argentina, second half of the 20th century) Abstract This article analyses the incorporation of contemporary topics into museums of the second half of the 20th century, focusing on cultural practices linked to circulation, collection and availability of objects for museum collections. Our aim is to articulate analytical perspectives and approaches of different historiography fields and subfields so as to deepen the study of museums with historical narratives—a line of research which, unlike other disciplines and other countries of the region, has only recently begun to be explored with a certain degree of systematization in Argentina. The hypothesis guiding the research is that political and sociocultural transformations in the international scene between the post-war period and the dawn of the 21st century had an impact on social sciences, stressing shifts of sense from history to memory and experiential testimony, and modifying collecting practices and traditional museum institutions. This, in turn, altered the fin-de-siècle notion of “history museum,” which presented transcendent events on the origins of the nation and the provinces, and triggered the emergence of new institutions aimed at addressing other topics, including contemporary events. The interests put at stake by certain actors in different political arenas also promoted the development of museum collections on specific topical issues over others. This configuration of the museum landscape continues to influence the ways in which 20th century phenomena are managed, interpreted and represented in the 21st century.
Copyright (c) 2026 María Élida Blasco https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Copyright (c) 1961 Mario Neme https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Raw masculinity: barbecue grills, gender prosthetics, and domestic space
This paper aims to present a case study that highlights the complex relationships between domesticity and gender: the domestic space dedicated to the barbecue grill, a setting gendered and coded as masculine – contrasting with the kitchen, typically coded as a feminine environment. Although these two spaces share similar functions, preparing and serving food, they can be marked by gender-specific features, including adornments that act as “gender prosthetics”, according to Paul B. Preciado’s theory. This study seeks to analyze one of these decorative (and functional) objects, here regarded as a masculinity prosthesis, considering both its symbolic and material aspects.
Copyright (c) 2025 Matheus Silva Dallaqua https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Behind the door: Practices around the domestic material life of the Rodrigues da Silveira Family in a Rural Neighborhood of São Paulo, 19th and 20th centuries
The changes in the Brazilian in the political-economic sphere at the end of the 19th century failed to change “life on the ground floor.” This study aims to study the material culture of the domestic environment of the Rodrigues da Silveira family, farmers of small and medium possessions in the neighborhood of Varejão between the municipalities of Itu, Sorocaba, and São Roque, investigating its characteristics from what is described by post mortem inventories, the information of which was crossed with the relevant bibliography, including literary works, which helped to elucidate the rural daily life of this social group. Even with the difficulty of imagining the furniture and other objects in their respective rooms, this study aimed to reflect, based on the practices that involved them, the ways of life of the residents, possibly marked by such belongings. The acts of sitting to talk, storing, sleeping, or cooking are closely linked to domestic fret. Thus, together with the ways of living of the farmers, material life has undergone few transformations, retaining a rusticity and modesty in the internal space of the rural dwellings of the analyzed region.
Leonardo Augusto de Oliveira Rodrigues da Silveira
Copyright (c) 2025 Leonardo Augusto de Oliveira Rodrigues da Silveira https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Fleeting Industrial Landscape: The disassemble of working villages and company towns in Brazil
This study analyzed the disassemble of working villages and company towns related to Brazilian factories and mining and timber companies, deeming it the end of the work management system based on the provision of housing by employers, generally linked to services such as schools, health center, club, etc. It shows how disassemble usually lasts for several years and is linked to often combined phenomena, including the closure of company activities, the change of owners or locations, the need to expand production areas, the valorization of land occupied by residential complexes, changes in production that involve demobilization of labor, and labor agreements. It emphasizes signs of discredit of the “working village” model in the 1950s, widespread sale of houses from the 1960s onward, and the acceleration and expansion of disassemble from the 1980s onward in a context of outsourcing of production segments, privatization of public companies, and widespread factory closures. Regarding the fate of buildings, it shows how disassemble can often simultaneously involve sale, rental, demolition, change of use, or abandonment to ruin. Regarding the fate of residential complexes, it shows how disassemble can remodel (sometimes associated with the conversion of a company town into a municipality or neighborhood), preserve, or destroy them (disappearance of buildings, land subdivision, and infrastructure).
Copyright (c) 2025 Telma de Barros Correia https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Colonial or not colonial, that’s the question: Curt Nimuendajú as collector for Brazilian and European Museums
The Brazilian anthropologist of German origin, Curt Nimuendajú, is considered a central figure in the history of Brazilian anthropology. His biography is marked by multiple roles: a brilliant ethnographer, an indefatigable recorder of indigenous language materials, a pioneer in Amazonian archaeology, and an unyielding defender of indigenous rights to life and land; but he also became known for his collecting activities for Brazilian and European museums. The central question of this paper is: how should Nimuendajú’s collecting activities be characterised? Can they be interpreted as a typical colonial enterprise undertaken by a White heterosexual male? The answers can only be found via a study of the detailed documentation of his activities, archived in various Brazilian, German, and Swedish museums and partially published. A careful reconstruction of the circumstances and itineraries of Nimuendajú’s expeditions and field trips shows that his case is not suitable to confirm certain stereotypes about collectors’ practices for European museums. Unlike in other cases, Nimuendajú did not compile collections for museums by robbery, looting, or trickery. Instead, he often relied on wearisome negotiations, payments, barter, and incentives to reproduce objects no longer fabricated, always establishing symmetrical relationships with his indigenous hosts. This reinforces my main argument that the study of historical collecting practices for ethnological museums must be based on careful evaluation of collectors’ biographies in order to avoid the risk of repeating clichés and stereotypes.
Copyright (c) 2025 Peter Schröder https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Canons, narratives, and diverse cartographies: architecture exhibitions in Latin America and the role of in Brazil
Throughout the 20th and 21st centuries, Latin American architecture has attracted international interest, manifested in various forms such as the exhibitions held by MoMA in 1955 and 2015, titled “Latin American Architecture since 1945” and “Latin America in Construction,” respectively. In 2018, the 17th Latin American Architecture Seminar exhibited Ethos de la arquitectura latino-americana: identidad-solidaridad-austeridad as a regional response to the discussion on architecture in Latin America. Considering these exhibitions, some questions arise: What are the main differences between these perspectives? How is the relationship of Brazilian architecture within Latin America established in these exhibitions? Therefore, this study aims to understand the role of Brazilian architecture in these three exhibitions about the architecture in Latin America. This research relies on bibliographical reviews and adopts the catalogues from the exhibitions as its primary source of investigation, specifically the works selected in the “Plates” section of each publication. The data were compared in search of recurrences and overlaps to find a possible web of relationships or points of contact between the exhibitions. As a result, this study found construction of canons, the emergence of new canons, and the constitution of cartographies of Latin American architecture from different perspectives.
Copyright (c) 2025 Mariana Fialho Bonates https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
The Goeldi Museum and Museum Education: the Trajectory and Challenges of an Educational Sector (2001-2022)
The Education Service of the Paraense Museum Emílio Goeldi, created in the late 20th century, has an academically explored trajectory. In this context, this study sought to analyze the development of the educational team of that sector from 2001 to 2022 to mitigate the study gap on its performance and trajectory. This qualitative research was guided by principles of the National Museal Education Policy, a bibliographic survey, documentary analysis, and semi-structured interviews with educators. It found more than 400 educational actions, classifying them as ephemeral or long lasting. The ephemeral actions were usually conducted by scholarships and addressed issues considered temporary emergencies, whereas long-term ones refer to those longer than four years that depended on museum professionals for their continuity. It also found a lack of theoretical-methodological foundation in the work developed by the team, highlighting the need for an educational and cultural program, which remains nonexistent in the institution. Moreover, several partnerships with public and private institutions were essential for these actions, generating some dependence on project maintenance. The analysis of the trajectory of the Education Service team showed standards, contradictions, and singularities that enrich the understanding of its performance, subsidizing reflections on the professionalization and structuring of museal education in the Paraense Museum Emílio Goeldi. This study may contribute to institutional memory and the strengthening of more solid and lasting educational practices.
Copyright (c) 2025 Iván Borroto Rodríguez, Leonardo Ryon Alves dos Santos https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Silence in the representation of violence in Museo de la Memoria, Montevideo, Uruguay
The Museo de la Memoria (Museum of Memory) opened in Montevideo, Uruguay, during the short life-span of transitional justice as a significant landmark of post-dictatorial memory. This paper analyzes the exhibitions from its founding in 2007 to 2018 using different documentary sources and interviews. It focuses on the form and representation of violence, including aspects such as exile, death and torture. Additionally, it tackles the breakdown of democracy in the 1970s, resulting from repressive policies and civil resistance strategies. By silencing popular violence, the Museum shapes the transmission of memory from the past into the present, hindering a profound reflection on the complexity of history.
Copyright (c) 2025 Maria Silvia Di Liscia, Marisa González de Oleaga, Maria del Carmen Ricciardo https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Museu das Juventudes Cariocas: Rio de Janeiro in a virtual collection of life stories and digital media artifacts
This study has two premises: (1) youth constitutes an anthropological and sociological category and a construction of memory and representation due to the dispute between subjectivities, experiences in the municipality, and generational meanings shared by cultural and media consumption and that (2) such intergenerational perspective gives rise to the intragenerational diversity of youths. This study aims to describe Museu das Juventudes Cariocas, a virtual museum under construction, dedicated to cariocas aged from 18 to 25 years with reports about their experiences in Rio de Janeiro in six decades (1960-2010). Its theoretical perspective includes contributions from sociology and anthropology of youth via José Machado Pais and Rossana Reguillo; museology literature on the categorization of museums and material culture via Monique Magaldi, Teresa Cristina Scheiner, and Daniel Miller; theories of social representations via Stuart Hall; and theories of memory via Maurice Halbwachs. This research on the creation of the Museum applies a literature review, life history, and documentary research. As a result, this research found shared generational meanings, such as music and musical genres, fashion, spaces and places of sociability in Rio de Janeiro, daily practices, political contexts, sexuality, among others. It also found daily experiences delimited by financial aspects, moral aspects, and geographical boundaries.
Copyright (c) 2025 Cláudia Pereira https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
rom construction models to hobby pieces: A genealogy of Portuguese naval miniatures from the XVII century to the beginning of the XX
This study aims to understand the meanings and uses of Portuguese naval miniatures from the 17th century to the beginning of the 20th one. By mapping these artifacts, this study seeks to show the three main categories of the period: construction models, teaching instruments, and hobby objects. Despite their physical similarity, modern naval miniatures constitute a diversity of object categories that reflect the rationalization of naval construction, the importance of using miniatures in the practical and civic instruction of sailors, and the diffusion of naval icons in general culture. Based on the Portuguese experience, this study analyzes how ship models emerged in the 17th century associated with a new perspective of naval construction in which the scale miniature of a real vessel emerged as a modern construction technique. It then investigates the formation of didactic collections of instruments for technical instruction and civic education for officers and marine guards in 19th-century naval schools and museums. Finally, it examines the birth of the private collection, which shows the popularization of naval miniatures as hobby pieces.
Copyright (c) 2025 Helder do Nascimento Viana https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
A Collection in Flames: Fire and Recovery of the Research and Documentation Center at FAU UFRJ
This study discusses the conservation project at the Research and Documentation Center of the Faculty of Architecture and Urbanism, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro following the fire that originated at the Legal Affairs Office of that university that impacted its core in April 2021. Funded by the Getty Foundation, the project recovered 17,164 paper documents and 7,374 photographs, a significant effort to conserve architectural and urban planning records in Brazil. This study describes the damage caused by the fire, detailing the emergency work to save burned, sootcontaminated, and water-damaged items; and outlines the methodologies adopted to clean, stabilize, and store them. Despite the lack of infrastructure and budget, compounded by the current precarious state of the building housing the center—the Jorge Machado Moreira Building at the University City campus—, the project managed to achieve significant progress in stabilizing and conserving the collection. This study emphasizes the need for public policies to conserve and prevent incidents in permanent collections and archival preservation areas. Despite substantial results, irreparable losses warns of the urgency of investing in preserving the national historical heritage.
Copyright (c) 2025 Andrés Martín Passaro, Jonas Delecave, Ozana Hannesch, Thais Helena de Almeida, Sandra Cristina Serra Baruki, Patricia Riggo Cordeiro https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
“If history is ours, memory belongs to us”: challenges and contributions of Memorial Brumadinho to Community Museologies
This study analyzes the trajectory of Memorial Brumadinho, created due to the collapse of the mining company Vale dam, Córrego Mina do Feijão, in Brumadinho, Minas Gerais, which caused one of the biggest socio-environmental crimes-tragedies in Brazil. It aims to understand the conception and struggle to manage Memorial based on the articulations of Associação dos Familiares de Vítimas e Atingidos pelo Rompimento da Barragem Mina Córrego do Feijão – Brumadinho. It describes some of the challenges and contributions of memorials of victims and those affected by crimes-tragedies to Community Museologies and the disputes about memory, reparation, and belonging. Its qualitative methodology favors case studies via bibliographical research and documentary analysis. It mobilizes sources such as specialized bibliography, journalistic articles, technical reports, memorial website and social media posts, visits it, and participation in public hearings. This study aims to show the importance of relativizing and problematizing concepts and of perceiving museological processes as fictions and frictions in constant adaptations, reinventions, and crossings.
Copyright (c) 2025 Clovis Carvalho Britto https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Copyright (c) 2024 David Ribeiro, Maria Aparecida de Menezes Borrego https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Introduction to the dossier “Producing, accumulating and transmitting knowledge in the Portuguese empire: material practices, visual artifacts and creativity
ECM/Dossiê - Produzir, acumular e transmitir conhecimentos no Império português: práticas materiais, artefatos visuais e criatividade
Copyright (c) 2024 Iris Kantor, Gisele Cristina da Conceição https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Introduction to the dossier “Ipiranga: from outskirts to place of memory”
ECM/Dossiê - Ipiranga: de arrabalde a lugar de memória
Copyright (c) 2024 Paulo César Garcez Marins, Marly Rodrigues https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
How do you decolonize a museum? The current debate on colonialism and museums with Americanist content in the Spanish press
The question “how to decolonize a museum?” implies that it has been assumed that it is convenient, or even necessary, to do so. Could be said that in Spain we are at a previous point in the discussion. Here the question of whether or not there was colonization, whether it is manifested in museums, and whether this whole issue is a scientific matter, or the result of the political situation is still being debated. However, at the same time, the question of how to decolonize is frequently put on the table and also attempts are made to answer it. This debate that we have described has been taking place in Spain in recent years. And the controversy intensifies at certain times, with the interventions of politicians, journalists, and academics, which are recorded in the press, and which we will take as a primary source. We consider that assuming that the implications of the debate are restricted to what we have just said would be reductionist, since they are much richer and are related to the interweaving of science and politics, and more particularly to the contribution of former American colonialism to Spanish national identity.
Copyright (c) 2025 Inmaculada Simón Ruiz, Eva Sanz Jara https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
The use of steel in the Preservation and renewal of historic heritage: A case study of the Janete Costa Museum in Niterói, Brazil
This article investigates the use of steel in heritage buildings. Its case study is the building that houses the Janete Costa Museum, designed by Mauro Costa Santos and opened in 2013. Listed as a heritage site in Niterói, the building underwent a restoration and expansion process, in which steel played an essential role in reconciling preservation and modernization. Its purpose is to analyze the structural recovery of these two historic buildings (twinned), which were transformed into a museum, with the aim of investigating the used intervention methods and how the use of steel helped and enhanced the modifications that were made. It analyzes the interventions carried out, highlighting the application of the main restoration theories, with an emphasis on Cesare Brandi’s theory. It demonstrates its relevance in architectural revitalization and the use of steel. It investigated the forms of intervention employed and how steel enhanced the structural modifications to provide stability, functionality and preservation of the historic building. In addition to its strength and versatility, steel is a sustainable solution that is aligned with the principles of reversibility. It also reduces waste, minimizes the need for new materials and allows the space to have large spans and the expected contrast between old and new. It is expected that this study will contribute to encouraging new research and expanding the adoption of this approach in the construction market, in order to promote interventions compatible with the preservation of architectural heritage.
Copyright (c) 2025 Renata Freire Machado Bastos, Orlando Celso Longo https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0