Reframing Michaelense—not costumes, 2024
In my previous role as a researcher and Design Director, I discovered that my ancestors were buried in the archives of the Harvard Library.
Dumbfounded by both the archives’ medium and message, I reframed the portraits to challenge the colonial representations of the Azorean people from São Miguel Island. Originally cataloged by institutions like Harvard University as Costumes of the Michaelense, these images reduced rich, complex lives to static, ethnic types for consumption by institutional knowledge systems. By restaging and reinterpreting these portraits, I disrupt the objectifying gaze and reposition the subjects—and their descendants—as agents of their own narratives, wearing workwear, not costumes.
Top; Rapozo, R. (n.d.). Costumes of Michaelenses, Azores, Portugal (barefoot man with beard wearing long over shirt standing with two jugs tied to wooden balanced on left shoulder, holding staff in right hand). c. 1880-c. 1889, Albumen silver print on card, Harvard University Library. Bottom; Reframing Michaelense—not costumes, label, 2024.