Architecture of Disappearance: Black Self-Portraits and Counter-Visuality as Reparative Aesthetics

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.21814/vista.6583

Keywords:

self-portrait, Black peripheral photography, reparative aesthetics, counter-visuality, Roger Silva

Abstract

This article analyses the self-portrait series Arquitetura do Desaparecimento (Architecture of Disappearance) by Brazilian photographer Roger Silva. Silva’s photographs are presented as an aesthetic and political expression of decolonial counter-visuality produced by Black photographers from peripheral contexts. Through self-portraiture, the artist articulates a gesture of re-existence that challenges normative regimes of visibility, identity, and representation. The study draws on decolonial theory (Azoulay, 2021; Fanon, 1952/2008; Maldonado-Torres, 2020), image studies (Campt, 2021), representation (Hall, 2006, 2013/2016) and reparative aesthetics (Best, 2016) to interpret Silva’s images as symbolic devices of resistance to racism and of the reconstruction of subjectivities. The captions accompanying the photographs are incorporated into the analysis as discursive extensions of the visual work, revealing invisible layers of the experiences portrayed. The article demonstrates that contemporary Black self-portraiture, particularly that developed by Black photographers from the peripheries, constitutes an artivist practice of meaning-making, fabulation and symbolic healing, creating new visual grammars that subvert the logic of the coloniality of seeing and knowing. This article argues that these images contribute to strengthening a counter-visuality established through the language of Black peripheral photography.

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Author Biographies

  • Emanuele de Freitas Baz´ílio, Programa de Pós-Graduação em Estudos da Mídia, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte, Natal, Brazil

    Emanuele de Freitas Bazílio holds a master’s degree and is currently a PhD candidate in the Postgraduate Programme in Media Studies at the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte (UFRN), Brazil, with a doctoral research stay at the Interdisciplinary Centre of Social Sciences, School of Social Sciences and Humanities, NOVA University Lisbon. She is a specialist in Human Rights from Faculdade Tecnológica de Palmas (2022) and holds a bachelor’s degree in Social Communication with a major in Journalism from UFRN (2016). Her research interests include images, race, visual culture, popular culture, media, and human rights. She is a member of the VISU — Laboratory of Visual Practices and Poetics — National Council for Scientific and Technological Development. She works as a lecturer, researcher, and professional photographer, with experience in television and radio production, press relations (governmental and private), and photography. She collaborates in the research project Olhos Negros: Visibilidades e Alteridades na Fotografia Negra Contemporânea. She has also been part of the Folk Communication Research Network and participated in extension projects at UFRN, such as the Agency of Experimental Multimedia Communication and Comtrilhas — Communication in the Trilhas Potiguares Programme (UFRN).

  • Daniel Meirinho, Escola de Comunicação, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

    Daniel Meirinho is an associate professor at the School of Communication, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. He is a permanent faculty member of the Postgraduate Programme in Media Studies (Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte). He is a member of the VISU — Laboratory of Visual Practices and Poetics — National Council for Scientific and Technological Development. He holds a PhD in Communication Sciences from the School of Social Sciences and Humanities, NOVA University Lisbon (2013), with academic exchanges at Goldsmiths College (University of London) and the Autonomous University of Barcelona. He obtained a master’s degree in Communication and the Arts from the same university (2009) and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at the Postgraduate Programme in Communication, Rio de Janeiro State University (2019). He taught at the Department of Social Communication, Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte (2016–2025), and was a visiting researcher (FAPERJ, 2024–2025) at the School of Communication, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro. He is also a photographer, visual artist, independent curator, and cultural producer. His research focuses on the politics of the image, with emphasis on artistic and contemporary approaches, particularly race studies, representation, contemporary Afro-Brazilian art, photography, performance, and decoloniality.

  • Ricardo Campos, Centro Interdisciplinar de Ciências Sociais, Universidade NOVA de Lisboa, Lisbon, Portugal

    Ricardo Campos holds a bachelor’s and a master’s degree in Sociology and a PhD in Visual Anthropology. He is a researcher at the Interdisciplinary Centre of Social Sciences, NOVA University Lisbon, Portugal. He currently coordinates two research projects: Artcitizenship – Jovens e as Artes da Cidadania: Ativismo, Cultura Participativa e Práticas Criativas (Artcitizenship – Youth and the Arts of Citizenship: Creative Practices, Participatory Culture and Activism; 2019–2021) and TransUrbArts – Artes Urbanas Emergentes em Lisboa e São Paulo (Emergent Urban Arts in Lisbon and São Paulo; 2016–2020), both funded by the Foundation for Science and Technology/Ministry of Science, Technology and Higher Education. He is also one of the editors of the Brazilian academic journal Cadernos de Arte e Antropologia (https://cadernosaa.revues.org/), co-coordinator of the Visual Culture Group of the Portuguese Association of Communication Studies and co-coordinator of the Luso-Brazilian Research Network on Arts and Urban Interventions.

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Published

2025-10-23

Issue

No. 16 (2025): Photographic Portrait: Convergences, Divergences, Reflections and Thoughts

Section

Thematic Articles

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Copyright (c) 2025 Emanuele de Freitas Bazílio, Daniel Meirinho, Ricardo Campos

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Authors own the copyright, providing the journal with the right of first publication. The work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

How to Cite

Architecture of Disappearance: Black Self-Portraits and Counter-Visuality as Reparative Aesthetics . (2025). Vista, 16, e025019. https://doi.org/10.21814/vista.6583

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