BELONY ALMA FERREIRA Santo Antônio da Patrulha, RS, Brasil, b. 1935

Belony Ferreira (Santo Antônio da Patrulha, RS, 1935) was 53 years old when she joined the Free Studio of the Porto Alegre City Hall to take a course in “Art for the Elderly.” A farmer, born and raised amid sugarcane cultivation, she discovered the visual arts in her later years, giving her old companion, the land, the leading role in her work.

A political activist, she participated in 1985, in Rio Grande do Sul, in the occupation of the Annoni Farm, a landmark in the founding of the Landless Rural Workers Movement (MST). Six years later, returning to the site, she found the land impregnating the skin and clothes of the farmers, who, temporarily settled there, were seeking a permanent settlement. In the artist's memory: "When I arrived, it had rained. In the middle of the woods, there was a stream and some women were washing clothes. I went up to them and, on the way back, they walked in front of me along a very narrow trail. They stepped on the soggy earth, their boots getting stuck, some losing their sandals, which were stuck to the ground. It was red clay, very red, pure pigment, which looked like blood. I stood there looking at it, very impressed by that heavy, strong clay that stuck to them. And I thought: How crazy... What makes these people so determined, so willing to resist, to fight? It can only be the strength that comes from this land. Without really knowing why, she picked up a bag of that clay. 

Back in Porto Alegre, she thought about modeling something, trying her hand at ceramics, but soon gave up. She then began to use clay as paint: “I put a little bit on a piece of white paper and... Holy Mother of God!!! It was incredibly vibrant!!!” Impressed, Belony began to explore the multiple possibilities of this material. Between pigment, color, texture, and cry, in the face of the various climate emergencies ravaging the planet, earth/Terra is her theme, material, and form.