MARIA THEREZA ALVES

Born in Brazil, 1961

Lives and works in Germany and Italy

In an image from Maria Thereza Alves’s 1980 interview with Tupã-Y Guaraní, also known as Marçal de Souza, the indigenous leader stands on the boundary of his people's lands, pointing at the mountain to which their territory once extended. During their talk, Tupã-Y advised Alves to work in the international field for indigenous rights. In 1983, his brutal murder was orchestrated by a Euro-Brazilian landowner who coveted the lands of the Guaraní.

Internationally recognized for her work as an activist and artist, Alves co-founded the Partido Verde (Green Party) of São Paulo, Brazil and represented the Partido dos Trabalhadores (Workers’ Party) of Brazil to the United States. In such long-term projects as Seeds of Change, Alves, studies colonialism, slavery, and global trade by cultivating the seeds found in ballast—the waste material historically used to balance ships in maritime trade.  

Dumped in ports at the end of passages, ballast often carried “dormant” seeds collected from their place of origin. They can remain in the soil for hundreds of years before germinating and growing. Alves identifies the seeds as she looks at how plants trace the displacement of lands and people from the transatlantic slave trades.

Maria Thereza Alves has worked and exhibited internationally since the 1980s, creating a body of work investigating the histories and circumstances of particular localities to give witness to silenced histories. Her projects are researched-based and develop out of her interactions with the physical and social environments of the places she lives, or visits for exhibitions and residencies.

Visit the artist’s website: www.mariatherezaalves.org