A revista O Observador Econômico e Financeiro e as favelas cariocas: fotografia documental e os regimes de representação da pobreza urbana (1942-1953)

In: Revista Maracanan, Heft 24, S. 90-114

Abstract

The article analyzes the photoreports with images of "favelas" from the O Observador Econômico e Financeiro magazine, between 1942 and 1953, when the photographer Mozar Alves da Silva was part of the editorial team. Founded in 1936 by Valentin Rebouças, O Observador Econômico e Financeiro was a magazine specialized in social and economic analysis, in context of develpmentalismo. In the 1940s, the magazine incorporated part of the graphic innovations introduced by O Cruzeiro, giving greater prominence to photographs in its reports to document the country's economic transformations. The theme of favelas was the subject of reports that deal with the urban modernization of the Federal Capital. The photographs reiterate the myth of the Favela in Rio de Janeiro and dramatized discourses and stigmas of urban poverty from the debate on "social marginality".