Masks

Masks are interesting things. They have the ability to define a person, group or even a nation. When thinking about masks I think about luchadors from Mexico, Batman and Phantom of the Opera. Each one hides what really lies beneath whether it be identity or truth. I think I am fascinated with masks because when I heard that Museum of People and Cultures at BYU had an exhibit about masks, I stopped by on the way to work at the Provo City Library. It was interesting to learn how in Latin cultures masks are used to represent what people want to reflect in themselves.
  Today when we went to work with CCJ the director there asked us to reflect on our experiences and impressions of the Northeast of Brazil up til now and reflect that in a drawing that we would put on a wall. There is a distinction here between graffiti as an art and tagging as vandalism. I agree with the difference because there is one that uses space to project a message, usually one directed at the lower class, and one used for gang related activity and competition. In Brasilia the shops that had graffiti art weren't tagged and looked much better. Another example is the picture shown on my blog (see up top). It comes from an area where a local artist had done murals to represent his beliefs as a Christian and a Brazilian.

                                                    What I think of when someone says street graffiti

  So I set to work trying to think of trying to represent my view of the Northeast of Brazil. I view the Northeast as a complicated entity of heritage, social differences and an uncertain future. So I tried to represent that in my picture. As I finished, I found that I had taken the deep end of application of the exercise and I didn't want to try to explain my picture, so I pretended I had worked with another class member so I didn't look like an overenthusiastic academic, because they are never any fun to hang out with. I'm not saying that my classmates weren't thinking, but it was that my view seemed so different that I didn't want to stand out. So I'm putting it here.

It has symbols of the Brazilian and Pernambucano flag along with marking it's location on the map of Brazil to represent the Northeast, but I also put the world for the rising influence of Brazil in the world. I put all of this on a mask to represent how whenever I feel I understand what Brazil is and who the people are, it feels like I take off one mask and I don't really know who is underneath.
  While thinking about this on the bus (funny how that came up again so quickly), I realized that I was also putting up a mask by changing the ways I wanted to be perceived. So this begs the question: "Would the real Josh please step forward?"
I don't think anyone other than Vanessa and my housemates will see this, so I feel comfortable letting the world know what I did. Or is that a mask? Is this all a ploy for attention or is this real?
Stay tuned next time for our next edition of 'Little Blog in Brazil' with Michael Landon.