i think this is just so interesting

"Brazil" is named after an indo-pacific tree, brazilwood. Long before 1500, Portuguese traders and elites valued this tree because it could be processed into rare red dye.

Mistaking this "newfound" tree in the "new" world, Portuguese traders changed the coast's colonized name from "Land of the Holy Cross" to "Land of Brazil (trees)". God turned to Capital, misery, and death.

The coastal "brazilwood" would become the continent's first overextracted material for colonizer's gain. it is now considered an endangered species.

so Mejia's art/anthropology project is implicitly in dialogue with the history of colonization yet seeks instead bridges of knowledge and culture; she seeks not the exploitation of land and labor but the illumination of Indigenous life and practice; all oriented around dye.