Marina Oliveira Barbosa: To start off, thinking about life and how it contributes to or influences art, I’d like to ask you to introduce yourself. I’d like to know where you’re from and where you currently live.

 

Rafael Segatto: I was born in Vitória, Espírito Santo, which is also where I currently live. But I spent my childhood between the far north of Espírito Santo and the far south of Bahia. I come from a family of fishermen, but it’s a tradition that has, to some extent, been lost within the family context. However, during my childhood, I grew up by the sea thanks to my father, who took me fishing. And, to a certain extent, everything I learned about the sea—right up until the beginning of my adult life—was from him.

 

Marina Oliveira Barbosa: Given that you seek to recall your childhood in order to understand yourself today, how does your body respond to the sea? What is your current artistic practice like?

 

Rafael Segatto: When I actually decide to be an artist and become one, I end up reconnecting with the sea, and realizing that to some extent I have family memory work to do, but I also think about how that memory can expand into a collective, right?

Especially understanding that the sea is the flow of the African diaspora, right? It’s the Black Atlantic—in short, understanding a little about the Atlantic. So, I think that’s how I understand that my body is somewhat part of this process. In this relationship I’ve always had with the sea, starting with my father, and then my own paths unfold within art with other writers, with other workers of the sea—well, that’s where I go, also following my own context, right? I think one thing is that, for some people who are from the sea, we often say that those who have saltwater in their blood to some extent can’t shake it off, so we always return to the sea.

 

Marina Oliveira Barbosa: That’s so beautiful what you said… Do you also see religion as something that’s hard to separate from?

 

Rafael Segatto: Right. I think, first and foremost, I see religion as a philosophy. And I understand that there is no separation between the visible and the invisible, you know? And in fact, the understanding that there is an integration within the multiplicity of life—whether it’s my body, this matter that’s here now, or the other living beings out there. And I talk about this a lot because my work takes place largely in the water, in my encounter with water in general.

I cross them because Vitória is an archipelago, and I walk to the islands to collect a series of materials that are living materials in transition to another stage of life, and they teach me a lot about understanding these stages of life, but also what remains of the process of being that which has been transmuted. And when I think about this, I think of the philosophical foundations of African origin, but we know that indigenous origins also come from the original peoples. But for me, especially of Bantu origin, because Vitória is a Bantu city, we are in a context where these philosophies are very present. We know that Brazil is a Bantu country, obviously because of the number of people from sub-Saharan Africa who arrived here. And we also know the negotiations that were necessary for survival, right, of the Bantu traditions and other Afro-Brazilian traditions.

Marina Oliveira Barbosa: Your work features some religious symbols. What is your creative process?

 

Rafael Segatto: This is very important to me because my home is a place where Umbanda and Candomblé intersect. And in fact, when I go to the water, when I go to the sea, when I go to create my work, I am not disconnected from my own technique; I profess my faith as my philosophy. And in this specific context, my work is also a result of that; when I bring it to life in an exhibition, I also think of it as a materialization of energy—how the foundations of the terreiro will be present in everything I do. Just as there is the so-called art space—like a museum or a gallery—it is also within my own home, within my terreiro, and sometimes even in other places where I have some kind of access or intimacy. So, whatever material I gather, I infuse into my work; this will also be brought into my home because it is also a foundation, you know? It will be presented there. 

Last year I had an experience with the Carmópolis quilombo in Minas Gerais, which is a Bantu quilombo; and of course I brought some spiritual essence to them as well. This year I had an experience at Jurema and brought a key to that spiritual essence. All my work is kind of intertwined; one thing is inseparable from the other. And so I like to briefly explain what my artistic practice is, because in fact it follows this path of both materializing and enchanting these beings who have already been transmuted; this becomes a work of art, but these materials also go to sacred places like that. Because it is the thought of the foundation and the thought that all of this is inseparable—both these materialities and our way of being and acting in the world.

 

Marina Oliveira Barbosa: Still on the subject of religion, your work lies somewhere between Candomblé and Umbanda, right? I noticed that you use—or rather, perform—the pemba. How did you develop this practice? 

 

Rafael Segatto: Yes. The pemba is called efun in Candomblé and, obviously, has different foundations, but it shares certain principles, naturally through each ontology. I end up calling it “chalk”; I create the pemba because I have a very strong connection to Bantu ontologies, and within Bantu ontologies, chalk is considered a pemba. But that’s it—it’s based on the idea that you’re constructing an element for ritual use, and those foundational elements are present there. Because I am a person who was born in the water and lives in saltwater. I say that I created a marine pemba because these are the foundations that end up being part of my work. And from there, I’ll think about this logic of the crossed-out points, whether by materializing drawings, paintings—in short, things that are very much within this logic—or also the way I think about my own body in the water. Because I end up tracing routes, paths, directions that are both, let’s say, visible directions as well as invisible ones; the sea, for me, is the same as studying the fact of being—it is the junction between worlds.  And in Bantu philosophies, Kalunga is a fundamental energy; we’re talking about the vital fluid, and if we think of the horizon line as the Kalunga line—that’s where the world of the living and the world of the dead are divided—that’s where the worlds meet. So, I like to think about that aspect—how I perform my pemba—but I also draw my own pemba as I travel the world. Based on the routes and paths and what I build as I work.

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Marina Oliveira Barbosa: When you tell your whole story, were you already involved in the religion since childhood, or did you join the religion as an adult?

 

Rafael Segatto: No, I joined the religion as an adult; I think I was about eight years old, give or take a few months. And obviously, I know I have some family traditions that weren’t really talked about at home, but to some extent, what draws me to the terreiro is the sea, which is where I’ve been my whole life. But I spent time away from the sea because I had to study, had to go to college—in short, I fell into a routine that distanced me from those family roots, and then, to some extent, over time, through a series of things that can’t be explained from a rational standpoint, I return to the sea, and when I return to the sea, I understand that I have a commitment there to fulfill—because of that family memory, but also because of a true calling in my life and in my present. And from that point on, I began to understand that the terreiro is a place that will help me understand, so to speak, these demands.

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Marina Oliveira Barbosa: ​What materials do you use to create your work?

 

Rafael Segatto: I always think that the materials find me to some extent; there’s a process of encounter that allows the work to come into being. And I like to say this because there’s also an element of time involved—between the materials I find, or that find me—because I think it involves an exercise in understanding the tides and ocean currents. And based on that, I live in a territory that is rich in organic matter. Generally, we have two types—I’ll speak broadly: minerals and organic matter. Vitória is a territory of abundant organic matter; it is a territory of much death, and consequently, of great fertility. So, through the ocean currents, I can tell where these beings will end up.

 

I think this is an important point to make because it really is work—it takes time, in the sense of a partnership, you know? First, I need to learn to read the sea; then I need to be in the sea; and then I also need other beings to help make my work happen—I’m talking about the decomposition of organic matter, so vultures and microorganisms, for example, along with the sun, rain, wind, and night, are very important for my work to happen because, until I find a certain material, I’ll always be moving between material and being, because these are beings that are, or will transmute, or are in the process of transmuting. And then, until I find it and have time for it to become work, it can take a few days or even months. Or even for me to understand, for example, how I use each material in my work also takes time, because, for instance, we have a very strong marine economy, and the harvesting of sururu is one of those things. So there are a lot of people who collect sururu along the beaches or in the mangroves, and then there’s the cooking process. 

 

So I take some of that ash—since I end up coming across it—and use it to make paint, to create pigments. But for me to understand the process of taking the ash and turning it into pigment, that took, I don’t know, two years, because it’s one thing to encounter the materiality, and another to understand what that materiality is telling you, you know? So my work has this very strong processual aspect and a dialogue with time and with what I call agents of time, which is also very profound. I think that’s one point; the other point is that these materialities will be both these things that become pigments—like ash, certain types of soil—but also turtle bones, because we’re in—Vitória is a Bay of Turtles; it’s even an area of environmental production. So it’s a region with many turtles, especially young ones.

 

So, obviously, I’ll find a lot of live turtles while I’m in the water, but I’ll also find a lot of dead ones. And I end up using them—whether it’s their keratin, which makes up the shell and the underside… I always forget the name of the underside of a turtle’s shell. Whether it’s their bones themselves, they end up finding their way into my work, just like seeds from the coastal sand dunes in general—oxeye daisy, pigeon’s eye, beach parsley. I’m using the names I know here; maybe in other regions they have different names too. So I collect these seeds, and from there I create installations, producing a series of things, and also incorporating beads from the terreiro; then I combine these with other materials I end up acquiring or collecting at the shipyards.

 

Shipyards are places where boats are built or repaired. And I end up spending time in those places too, meeting some people who are master carpenters and so on, and then I end up getting—I don’t know—ropes that aren’t useful for boats anymore, old fishing hooks, and so on. So I kind of collect all these materials and then take them to my studio. So I usually say that I live in an open-air studio, but then I go to my studio to look at these materials and see what I can build with them. And then I usually think, obviously, about the fundamental elements that the terreiro brings to me to build these works of art.

 

Marina Oliveira Barbosa: I see a lot of music and sound in your work. Do you also feel surrounded by diverse sounds?

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Rafael Segatto: I find it very interesting when you bring up this idea of seeing music in my work because, even though there isn’t always an audible sound production in my work, I also have a very deep connection with music—especially samba—so in some of my compositions, I think about rhythmic patterns that come from samba, for example. So, based on that, I’ll create an installation that will have the beat of a rhythmic tambourine.

So even though there isn’t a sound to the rhythmic concept—which I think is the Afro-Brazilian rhythmic concept—I think we’re more focused on sounds, but it’s also present in food, in the visual arts, and in the performing arts. I think the concept of rhythm as an aesthetic is something that runs deeply through my work, and it is obviously also a sonic, musical concept. But I end up thinking about how this concept can take on other forms, other materialities, beyond sound.

 

Marina Oliveira Barbosa: Would you like to mention any other references that have influenced your work?

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Rafael Segatto: I think maybe it’s just to reinforce—I don’t even know if it’s reinforcement—but when we were talking about Leda Maria Martins, about the idea of time spiraling and all that, I think that for me, Milton Santos is also a very important figure, because I often say that I felt like a defective machine before reading Milton Santos. He has a text—it’s called “In Praise of Slowness”—that analyzes this logic of capitalism and the variations in speed that humanity experiences, and despite capitalism constantly pushing us to accelerate, I think this text was very important for understanding this whole relationship of temporality and this interspecies relationship as well, which I feel is very present in my work. So I think that’s it—Milton Santos has also been very important in my career.