Magic, crime and art in early 20th-century Afro-Brazilian Religions

At the beginning of the 20th century, a set of pioneering texts examined the artistic dimension of artefacts manufactured and used in Brazilian religious communities, which were linked to African belief systems. These works were authored by physicians Raymundo Nina Rodrigues and Arthur Ramos—considered the founding figures of the field of Brazilian Anthropology—the museum expert and art critic Mário Barata, and Afro-Brazilian artist and intellectual Manuel Querino. They argued from Afro-Brazilian religious communities practices and material culture, but also from the collections of those artefacts they constituted for themselves and from the random sets of objects confiscated violently and unsystematically by the police.