biarritzzz
[TT]
Let's start from the beginning: how did the name biarritzzz come about? And how does it relate to biahits and B.I.A?
Let's start from the beginning: how did the name biarritzzz come about? And how does it relate to biahits and B.I.A?
[B]
An elementary school Portuguese teacher gave me this name. When calling out the students, Moniquinha would read their names and, when it was my turn, instead of calling 'Beatriz,' she always let out an amusing 'Biarritz!' I thought it was funny, and one day I asked what it was. She told me it was a beach in France. I was only 18 years old and started using it artistically and, since then, I have identified myself as a biarritzzz with three zeds imitating a sound like an electric shock or the imagery of lightning. Yet, I have also started to use biahits for a few years now, which have the same pronunciation in Portuguese. That is because I realize in 2019 that this would be my alter ego for sound-musical works, based on the production of Pátria – biahits feat. Vampiras Veganas (2019), a Brega-funk music and video clip that satirizes political situations. I made this video with images of our live performance at a philosophy colloquium at USP—which is connected to the meme logic and amateur Youtube productions, a culture that permeates contemporary productions in several other media. In 2020, when Diane Lima invited me to the exhibition Os Dias antes da Quebra, at Pivô Satellite, which she curated, I shared with her the independent production of an unfinished album I was making with my partner Henrique Falcão (until then, there were only ten songs written in a notebook and a beat). Then, we launched biahits – EU NÃO SOU AFROFUTURISTA (2020), an interactive web-specific sound-visual album, with ten songs and GIFs, with its own web development (by Pato Marques), and whose tracks were also on the streaming platforms. One of these tracks, B.I.A. – EX@ feat. Mun Há e Deize Tigrona, became the album's first single and a music video. The Instituto Moreira Salles funded the video clip through Heloisa Espada's invitation at IMS. For the first time in my entire career, two works were financed at the same time. In B.I.A. – EX@ feat. Mun Há e Deize Tigrona, I sign as BIA, the character I developed by appropriating MIA, a London-based Sri Lankan (Tamil) singer who originally composed the song XXXO and the homonymous 2010 music video, which I re-read and satirize.
An elementary school Portuguese teacher gave me this name. When calling out the students, Moniquinha would read their names and, when it was my turn, instead of calling 'Beatriz,' she always let out an amusing 'Biarritz!' I thought it was funny, and one day I asked what it was. She told me it was a beach in France. I was only 18 years old and started using it artistically and, since then, I have identified myself as a biarritzzz with three zeds imitating a sound like an electric shock or the imagery of lightning. Yet, I have also started to use biahits for a few years now, which have the same pronunciation in Portuguese. That is because I realize in 2019 that this would be my alter ego for sound-musical works, based on the production of Pátria – biahits feat. Vampiras Veganas (2019), a Brega-funk music and video clip that satirizes political situations. I made this video with images of our live performance at a philosophy colloquium at USP—which is connected to the meme logic and amateur Youtube productions, a culture that permeates contemporary productions in several other media. In 2020, when Diane Lima invited me to the exhibition Os Dias antes da Quebra, at Pivô Satellite, which she curated, I shared with her the independent production of an unfinished album I was making with my partner Henrique Falcão (until then, there were only ten songs written in a notebook and a beat). Then, we launched biahits – EU NÃO SOU AFROFUTURISTA (2020), an interactive web-specific sound-visual album, with ten songs and GIFs, with its own web development (by Pato Marques), and whose tracks were also on the streaming platforms. One of these tracks, B.I.A. – EX@ feat. Mun Há e Deize Tigrona, became the album's first single and a music video. The Instituto Moreira Salles funded the video clip through Heloisa Espada's invitation at IMS. For the first time in my entire career, two works were financed at the same time. In B.I.A. – EX@ feat. Mun Há e Deize Tigrona, I sign as BIA, the character I developed by appropriating MIA, a London-based Sri Lankan (Tamil) singer who originally composed the song XXXO and the homonymous 2010 music video, which I re-read and satirize.
Still do videoclipe M.I.A. – XXXO, 2010
[TT]
Do you foresee a continuity in the creation of these identities?
Do you foresee a continuity in the creation of these identities?
[B]
Playing with different characters has been a very fertile solution to deal with the world of images, appropriation, and remix in which I am inserted (aren't we all?). It is a way of playing with my body, often in self-debauchery. And that sometimes turns into a mockery of the music industry, of the circuits that tend to define what kind of language you are dealing with (body = performance? theater = theatricality?), and to the media culture itself and its policies. I can say that in playing with self-image, Samuel Fosso's work is a reference that touches me deeply. I am currently working with another character, A Desencantada [The Disillusioned], a brega-forró-sertanejo singer who wears a pink wig and is disillusioned with this world. I am also thinking about other characters, but these are still too embryonic to talk about here.
Playing with different characters has been a very fertile solution to deal with the world of images, appropriation, and remix in which I am inserted (aren't we all?). It is a way of playing with my body, often in self-debauchery. And that sometimes turns into a mockery of the music industry, of the circuits that tend to define what kind of language you are dealing with (body = performance? theater = theatricality?), and to the media culture itself and its policies. I can say that in playing with self-image, Samuel Fosso's work is a reference that touches me deeply. I am currently working with another character, A Desencantada [The Disillusioned], a brega-forró-sertanejo singer who wears a pink wig and is disillusioned with this world. I am also thinking about other characters, but these are still too embryonic to talk about here.
Still do videoclipe B.I.A. – EX@ feat. Mun Há e Deize Tigrona, 2020
[TT]
In our conversation, you commented on the idea of rescue and kidnapping. Tell a little more about these ideas and how they influence your production.
In our conversation, you commented on the idea of rescue and kidnapping. Tell a little more about these ideas and how they influence your production.
[B]
I live an intense need for rescue from the register of the kidnapping—this is a register that is ingrained in everything I feel: the spiritual, the territorial, the mental kidnapping. This work (EU NÃO SOU AFROFUTURISTA) is a rescue of my grandmother's stories in Miraíma, Ceará, but also about my great-grandmother, about my great-great-grandmother. It is also about grandfather's legacy, a great artist who lived here and in Poço da Onça, Ceará. This rescue is in my hands, feet, and all over my body, not because I want to return to those places but because I want to know a little bit of everything that has been lost. The rescue is in the elements of the cover, with symbology that represent these stories, oral records of the worlds that (they say) no longer exist, of the sky that has already fallen.
I live an intense need for rescue from the register of the kidnapping—this is a register that is ingrained in everything I feel: the spiritual, the territorial, the mental kidnapping. This work (EU NÃO SOU AFROFUTURISTA) is a rescue of my grandmother's stories in Miraíma, Ceará, but also about my great-grandmother, about my great-great-grandmother. It is also about grandfather's legacy, a great artist who lived here and in Poço da Onça, Ceará. This rescue is in my hands, feet, and all over my body, not because I want to return to those places but because I want to know a little bit of everything that has been lost. The rescue is in the elements of the cover, with symbology that represent these stories, oral records of the worlds that (they say) no longer exist, of the sky that has already fallen.
[TT]
You also talked about the idea of hacking in the context of artistic production in virtual media. Appropriation is a word that also comes up in this discussion. How do you see this scenario? And how do these terms come to you in your work?
You also talked about the idea of hacking in the context of artistic production in virtual media. Appropriation is a word that also comes up in this discussion. How do you see this scenario? And how do these terms come to you in your work?
[B]
The problem of algorithmic domination is an issue that reflects the systems in which we have been living throughout modernity. The modern, the colonial, and slavery as an economic system are synonymous and are the structures that inhabit all these codes, digital or not, invisible, virtual, on and off networks. Hacking codes is a metaphor and a necessity. I try to slide through axioms, confuse languages, unlearn a lot of things. That is why we are strengthened when we know that we do not do anything alone—this has been a constant practice.
The problem of algorithmic domination is an issue that reflects the systems in which we have been living throughout modernity. The modern, the colonial, and slavery as an economic system are synonymous and are the structures that inhabit all these codes, digital or not, invisible, virtual, on and off networks. Hacking codes is a metaphor and a necessity. I try to slide through axioms, confuse languages, unlearn a lot of things. That is why we are strengthened when we know that we do not do anything alone—this has been a constant practice.
Still do videoclipe B.I.A. – EX@ feat. Mun Há e Deize Tigrona, 2020
[TT]
Thinking about the entire commercial and artistic hub that revolves around the Brazilian Southeast, how do you see the influence of Recife, or the Northeast, in your work?
Thinking about the entire commercial and artistic hub that revolves around the Brazilian Southeast, how do you see the influence of Recife, or the Northeast, in your work?
[B]
It is hard to think how this influence would not take place given that this is where I live, what I see, what I breathe. For me, the entire cultural scene in Pernambuco is very important. Popular culture and spirituality are what keep not only my body but my dreams alive. I am constantly associated with machines because my work tools are digital. However, I always try to say that the digital is human, territorial, geographic, ethical, or not—but it is human in essence since it is this element that is behind the machines and codes, and not the other way around. I believe that culture, both here and in Ceará, where my family and relatives (now dead) come from, is present in my work even if I cannot see it. In addition to popular culture, the contemporary musical culture of Brega, Brega-funk, Tecno-Brega, and techno-melody, is the soundtrack and environment that makes the bodies here move and consequently mine too. Dance, body, and music have always surrounded me since my practice as a VJ in these environments—such a practice is the point where I developed almost all the visual experience reflected in my other works.
It is hard to think how this influence would not take place given that this is where I live, what I see, what I breathe. For me, the entire cultural scene in Pernambuco is very important. Popular culture and spirituality are what keep not only my body but my dreams alive. I am constantly associated with machines because my work tools are digital. However, I always try to say that the digital is human, territorial, geographic, ethical, or not—but it is human in essence since it is this element that is behind the machines and codes, and not the other way around. I believe that culture, both here and in Ceará, where my family and relatives (now dead) come from, is present in my work even if I cannot see it. In addition to popular culture, the contemporary musical culture of Brega, Brega-funk, Tecno-Brega, and techno-melody, is the soundtrack and environment that makes the bodies here move and consequently mine too. Dance, body, and music have always surrounded me since my practice as a VJ in these environments—such a practice is the point where I developed almost all the visual experience reflected in my other works.
Still do videoclipe M.I.A. – XXXO, 2010
[TT]
How do you see yourself as a dissident body in the Brazilian art scene?
How do you see yourself as a dissident body in the Brazilian art scene?
[B]
I do not see it. My body is in many places, and the little insertion it has in the art scene is still very little. My body is not mine alone. How many Siarás, Potyguaras, Parás, Amazonas fit in a gallery, museum, or music festival? People who migrate to the southeast and occupy spaces do not diminish the comfort of bringing in only those closest to them. In that sense, I still do not see almost anyone.
I do not see it. My body is in many places, and the little insertion it has in the art scene is still very little. My body is not mine alone. How many Siarás, Potyguaras, Parás, Amazonas fit in a gallery, museum, or music festival? People who migrate to the southeast and occupy spaces do not diminish the comfort of bringing in only those closest to them. In that sense, I still do not see almost anyone.
Still do videoclipe B.I.A. – EX@ feat. Mun Há e Deize Tigrona, 2020
M.I.A. XXXO, Official Music Video, Quadro 002
[TT]
Lastly, if you could travel to five years in the future, how do you imagine this future version of yourself, and what do you think your future self would say to you?
Lastly, if you could travel to five years in the future, how do you imagine this future version of yourself, and what do you think your future self would say to you?
[B]
I try to bounce back and forth all the time within this spiraling time that I live. Yesterday, today, and tomorrow are less distant than we imagine. I say that I believe in my dreams, I know they are not mine alone, and I try to make those near or far from me believe in it too. The dream is the connection of times; it is a technology, a political tool.
I try to bounce back and forth all the time within this spiraling time that I live. Yesterday, today, and tomorrow are less distant than we imagine. I say that I believe in my dreams, I know they are not mine alone, and I try to make those near or far from me believe in it too. The dream is the connection of times; it is a technology, a political tool.
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