ABSTRACT
On November 20, 2003, national Black Awareness Day in Brazil, the mayor of São Paulo, Marta Suplicy (2001–2004), announced plans to create the Museu AfroBrasil or AfroBrazil Museum. The foundation of this institution constituted one of the numerous steps the government had taken since 1988, the country's centenary of the abolition of slavery, to reexamine and recontextualize the social and cultural contributions that Africans and African descendants had made in Brazilian history. More than just a space for art exhibitions, this museum aimed to “tell an alternative Brazilian history” by “deconstructing an image of the Black population constructed from a historically inferior perspective” and “transforming it into a prestigious image founded on equality and belonging.” 1 Although Brazil has the highest number of peoples of African descent outside the African continent, this fact is not reflected in the country's cultural institutions. Therefore, the creation of a museum dedicated to representing the history of Brazil's African and Afro-Brazilian populations was momentous. Even more audacious, however, was that the institution would examine one of the darkest periods in the country's history—the era of slavery.
