Os vegetais político-selvagens de Clarice Lispector e as artes visuais de mulheres latinoamericanas

Abstract

The present thesis aims to highlight in vegetables the wild politics within the Latin American cultural context. To this end, we analyze the literary works A maçã no escuro (1961) and Água viva (1973), by Clarice Lispector (1920–1977), in dialogue with visual arts produced by women. Through plants, we emphasize insurgent radicalizations in the face of realities grounded in the metaphysical-colonial mentality, stemming from the complex history of Latin America. The present research supports creations associated with uprisings – a feminine aesthetic counterattack – whose force establishes the key to articulating criticism of systems that suppress life, especially during periods marked by heightened totalitarianism and historical fascisms. In this context, we see in the untamed a way through which politically charged works operate with a liberatory intent, both for oneself and for others. Common in cultural artifacts by Latin American women artists, botanical representations act as catalysts for the demobilization and decentralization of ideas constructed under patriarchy, such as the sociocultural framework that assigns women to the realm of fragility and obedience. In this research, as an “act of guerrilla,” we launch epistemological “arrows” from the South that critically (re)evaluate the artistic productions of the 1960s and 1970s in light of difference and alterity. For this work, we draw upon the studies of Benjamin (2019), Buck-Morss (2012), Cixous (2022), Didi-Huberman (2017; 2020; 2021), Deleuze e Guattari (2011), Foucault (1994), Garramuño (2012), Guimarães (2009;2020), Nascimento (2011; 2012; 2021), Santiago (2006; 2008; 2019), Sousa (2012; 2013; 2021), Viveiros de Castro (2002; 2015; 2018), among others.