Mecila

#44

Sao Paulo's Circuits of Diversity: A visit to the TEN Photography Exhibition at Centro Cultural Tomie Ohtake (São Paulo)

Stephanie Dennison (Mecila Senior Fellow, 2025)

In this short video, Mecila Senior Fellow Stephanie Dennison explores an exhibition of photographs taken by José Medeiros of the Teatro Experimental do Negro (Black Experimental Theatre group), one of the most important theatre troupes to emerge in 20th-century Brazil. Founded in 1944 by actor, director, and activist Abdias Nascimento, the group played a key role in the country’s cultural history. Stephanie is particularly interested in viewing the exhibition in the context of the so-called circuitos da diversidade (circuits of diversity), a phrase coined by scholar Gilberto Sobrinho to denote the shift in the representation of Afro-descendant cultural expressions in cultural centres such as Tomie Ohtake and Itaú Cultural in the city of São Paulo over the last ten years.