Says Fernanda: Working with travel photography in the last years, I could experiment tourism in its multiples dimensions. One of its aspects that really fascinates me is its democratization. In the last decade, Brazilian middle class increased its expenses on tourism by 277%. Displacement, besides being more frequent, is more accessible and while in the past traveling was a privilege reserved for an economic elite, today the picture has changed and around 50 million people from this social strata, according to one recent survey, have the desire to travel. Tourism is a two way street that can lead us way beyond the iconic spots: When we watch from the outside, it is easy to pinpoint the enormous impacts caused by tourists on the communities they visit. However, when we are the travelers, we are overwhelmed by a will of puerile happiness. Traveling for tourism is like a celebration and tourists vibrates in a frequency of pleasure and joy. The essay “Amazon B-Side” is portrait of this puerile and elusive feeling during a middle class journey in a cruise ship all-inclusive along the Black River on the Brazilian rainforest.
Fernanda Frazão, Brazilian, is a photographer and documentary filmmaker, graduated in Audiovisual Communication from Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP) and the University of Coruña (UDC), Spain. She works at the intersection of several media as a creative platform to tell stories in the themes related to gender and society. She directed her first feature film “Chega de Fiu Fiu” (2018) about sexual harassment against women in public spaces in Brazil, in partnership with the feminist organization Think Olga. The photograph project “Amazon B Side” is a LensCultures juror’s pick in 2017, has been exhibited in Brazil at MIS and Valongo Photo Festival and at Voies Off, during the Les Recontres d’Arles in 2018. She works as a freelancer in development, direction and creation in multimedia content and integrates News Screens’ core at O2 Filmes, the biggest prodution house in Brazi, as creative director in new formats, interactive and digital content. Lives and works in São Paulo, Brazil.
Website: fernandafrazao.com
