Ferrão launches new book and gallery exhibit in Goa
Frederick Noronha
Ferrão launches new book and gallery exhibit in Goa
R. Benedito FerrãoR. Benedito Ferrão is an Associate Professor of English and Asian & Pacific Islander American Studies at William & Mary. He is a prolific author and curator, having collaborated with artists such as Karishma D’Souza, Angela Ferrão and Vamona Navelcar. His current curation is of Maria Vanessa de Sa’s first solo exhibition, The Girl Who was the Color of Nothing, which is also the title of a children’s book he has co-created with the artist. The Girl Who was the Color of Nothing explores colorism, using the concept of a children’s book to engage adult readers and young ones, too. In the story, a family struggles to retain the light complexion of their daughter with tragicomic results. The tale delves into beauty standards that equate lighter skin with desirability and attractiveness. At its core, the book questions norms perpetuated by adults to the detriment of the self-esteem of children.
We interviewed Professor Ferrão as he prepares for the gallery opening on April 10 at Gallery Gitanjali in Goa (poster below).
Q: The Girl Who was the Color of Nothing is the title of your new book, which is being published and making its debut in Goa. Can you tell us about your partners in this latest endeavor?
The book comes out of a small Goan press called The Uninvited which does projects involving illustrated texts. Vanessa de Sa, Angela Ferrão, and I worked with them previously to produce the comic-zine The Uninvited Host: Goa and the Parties not Meant for its People (2023), which accompanied Angela’s exhibition, The Uninvited (2023).
If it seems coincidental that the press shares its name with Angela’s work, it is because that show was what inspired their moniker; the comic was their first publication. The Girl Who was the Color of Nothing is a limited-edition book that is the companion publication to Vanessa’s exhibition. The print run was supported by the Zhang-Liu Foundation to whom we are very grateful.
Q: What prompted you to write this story?
The story owes its nascence to a fourth-century legend. It concerns the establishment of a Roman edifice: The Church of Our Lady of the Snows. It was so named because snow fell on the hill that would become the site of the church’s construction. Now, what was unusual about this was that the snowfall occurred in August which, as we know, is not usually a snowy time in Europe. The event was thus considered a miracle.
Interestingly, although Goa is firmly in the tropics, it also has a church named for Our Lady of the Snows! Historical evidence points to the possibility that one of the first artistic representations of the Madonna to make its way to South Asia was a sixteenth century image of “A Nossa Senhora das Neves,” or Our Lady of the Snows. It was this that caught my imagination – the idea of “snow” (by way of Catholic artistry and missionizing) in a tropical land. And in the story, snow is synonymous with beauty and lightness of skin.
I have often thought about what it is that makes colorism so commonplace. As a literary and cultural studies scholar who teaches and researches about identity, race and racism, whiteness and anti-Blackness, among other things, I am mindful of how the institutions of everyday life, be they familial, religious, or educational, shape how we see ourselves and the world from the time we are little. Although these are subjects that I address as a scholar, I wanted to engage with identity-formation through a different kind of pedagogical approach. The Girl is my first foray into writing a children’s story, a form I wanted to experiment with in considering how young people are made to reflect the desires of their family and society.
As someone who specializes in the study of the former Portuguese India and its diaspora, I must admit that I was also influenced by how the nineteenth century haunts so much of the literary representation of these communities and their cultures – an effect, I think, of identity-formation in colonial circumstances. With that in mind, readers of the story may find that it is a little difficult to pin down when exactly the action takes place: it may feel simultaneously archaic and contemporary.
Q: As you mentioned, this is not the first time you’ve worked with Maria Vanessa de Sa. How did the story evolve? Did you approach her with your story and then work on the artwork, or was it a collaboration from the beginning?
Maria Vanessa da Sa
Vanessa (who, like me, uses her middle name over her first name, too!) and I have certainly worked on a couple of different projects. In addition to the Angela Ferrão comic-zine mentioned above, we also were part of the crew behind The Destination is the Journey (2017), a graphic novella I wrote which is illustrated by and loosely based on the life of the late artist, Vamona Navelcar (1929-2021). That was our first team effort and while in the throes of it, we began to think about the possibility of future collaborations.
I had known of and admired Vanessa’s artistry for a long time, drawn in as much by her aesthetic as also the contemporary themes she represents with such care: environmental degradation, socio-politics, and culture. Despite this, Vanessa has never had an exhibition dedicated to her work and so it seemed logical that this should be our next joint project.
Having agreed to work together again, when this story first began to brew within me, I somehow instinctively knew that it needed to be a children’s book. In turn, I hoped that it would be something Vanessa would be enthusiastic about, as well. On the evening that I finished writing the story, I read it out to Vanessa and her family in their Panjim home. Vanessa’s children, who were very young then, were enthralled – and that was a good sign! And then I asked Vanessa if she would consider doing this book with me; I was thrilled that she said yes.
Even though I had Vanessa’s art in mind as I imagined this book, nothing prepared me for the beauty of her paintings. Having this exhibition allows the public to see Vanessa’s works as they first looked before they were redesigned for the pages of our storybook, and that is very special. Just as with the two previous graphic narratives we worked on together, Vanessa and I traded a lot of ideas to effect the look and “feel” of this book, but its overall aesthetic is entirely due to the artist.
Q: What are the advantages—and challenges—of telling a story in a graphic format?
This is an interesting question for me to think of as a writer: while I may have an idea of how I think a graphic narrative should look, the ultimate outcome is almost entirely dependent on the artist. The creation of graphic narratives is as exciting as it is laborious. Making words and images meld is some strange but beautiful alchemy – the two parties work separately at first and then together to achieve a vision that is rarely the same as that which one begins with.
Vanessa and I have been working on The Girl since 2018, which is a long time in which to develop an understanding of one another’s artistic and writerly practices. But co-creating a book is never just about the working relationship, but also navigating the publishing industry, funding, and time and distance because we often worked on this project cross-continentally and very rarely while in the same geographic coordinates.
Q: I love the “disclaimer” – a children’s story for adults. Was that your intention from the beginning, or did you find that approach became more effective as you went along?
Someone very astute once told me that every children’s story is actually a tale for adults. I held on to that as I experimented with this style of writing that I had never assayed before. But really, I also envisioned this book as being equally instructive to all members of a family and something that could be shared by parents and children alike.
Q: You’ve used humor in your storytelling before – telling a serious story with a tone that allows the reader to engage with the subject without being guarded. Is that how you would describe your method?
Yes, The Girl is tragicomic. In so saying, one must reflect upon how these oppositional feelings co-exist. Things can be funny without being frivolous, as I have learned from some of my favorite comedians, people whose material is astute, cerebral even, in their takes on such serious subjects as war, violence, and social discord.
So, in The Girl, funny things happen in some of the most awkward and even grave moments. I hope that those details make readers laugh as they reflect upon the absurdity of the cultural constructs and beauty ideals society holds on to, often unquestioningly.
Q: How has the exhibit creation been going? Do you and Vanessa work closely on designing it?
Absolutely. Just this afternoon, we returned from the frame shop – an exciting step in bringing the exhibition together. Although this is the fifth exhibition I will have curated, it is something I am still learning about and so working closely with the artist is a great help.
Work like this is not possible without a great team behind you. Dr. Vishvesh Prabhakar Kandolkar, who heads William & Mary’s study abroad program in Goa, is managing the exhibition design while Fernando Velho designed the exhibition poster.
Q: Do you have an audience in mind for your exhibit? Your book?
Because so much of the inspiration for this project was Goa, it is great that Vanessa’s art from the book will be seen publicly for the first time at the atmospheric Gallery Gitanjali in the capital city of Panjim. Goa hosts many art and cultural events year-round, but very few of them celebrate Goan artists. Likewise, while Indian cinema and fiction may use Goa as a setting, cultural production by Goans themselves finds little championship. Accordingly, I hope that our audience (readers and exhibition-visitors alike) will be a wide swathe of the Goan public, ones eager to imbibe Goan art and storytelling.
That said, there are many universal elements to The Girl, both as a book and an art show. I hope both demonstrate how art and culture can contribute to an understanding of the complex negotiations of identity that occur in familial and social contexts.
Q: Is there a reaction you’re hoping to elicit? What you’re hoping a child would take away from it? An adult?
I hope the book gives readers a chance to reflect on those things we take for granted and even perpetuate in our relationship to colorism. For the child who reads this book, I would like them to feel that they have agency, that they can question things that affect them. And for adult readers, I hope it will help heal the child in them.
_/ Frederick Noronha फ्रेडरिक नोरोन्या * فريدريك نورونيا
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