Cleo de Verberena: the first Brazilian filmmaker

• Grant number: 17/13760-4
• Support type: Scholarships in Brazil - Doctorate
• Effective date (Start): April 01, 2018
• Effective date (End): May 31, 2021
• Field of knowledge: Linguistics, Literature and Arts - Arts - Cinema
• Principal researcher: Esther Império Hamburger
• Grantee: Marcella Grecco de Araujo
• Home Institution: Escola de Comunicações e Artes (ECA). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil

Abstract

This research intends to remove from oblivion the trajectory of the first Brazilian filmmaker, Cleo de Verberena, the artistic name of Jacyra Martins da Silveira. This study is in line with the recovery of the presence of several pioneer women who worked in the period of silent cinema, which raises new questions for the relationship between the emergence of cinema and gender relations in the early twentieth century. Jacyra Martins da Silveira founded a studio with her husband, César Melani, the Epica Filmes, and acts and directs her first and only film, O mistério do dominó preto (1931). Cleo de Verberena is the stage name that remained in the history of the cinema like a legend that would have appeared and disappeared without leaving vestige. Based on works of cultural and visual history that have contributed to increase the knowledge of the relations between cinema and life in the early twentieth century, this research seeks to understand the emergence of the pioneering experience of a woman in Brazilian cinema. What does the female presence reveal about the positioning of cinema as a professional and artistic activity at the beginning of the last century? To what extent does cinema participate in the inclusion of women in the public sphere? What is the specificity of Cleo de Verberena and Brazil? (AU)