Eternizando a primeira idade : a representação das crianças através das lentes dos fotógrafos Czamanski (1937-1980)

Abstract

During the 20th century, there was a continuous popularization of photography in Brazil, from port cities to inland cities, since European immigrants and travelers brought the technology to the country. As the presence of photographers expanded in national territory, the state of Rio Grande do Sul was no exception. In Santo Ângelo, the first member of the Czamanski family to start working in the photographic field was Armando Czamanski, around the decade of 1920. Following his example, his two brothers, Daniel and Deoclides, also became photographers, acting in several cities, mainly in the north of the state, bequeathing an expressive collection. The aim of the present study is to analyze the photographs made by the Czamanski brothers between the years of 1937 and 1980 that contain children, in order to identify how the photographers in the images represented children and childhood. Among the approximately 600 photographs found in different collections, 221 that fit the aforementioned prerequisites were selected. From the collection, it was possible to apply the analysis methodology composed and adapted from the studies of Mauad (1990) and Canabarro (2011). The images were organized and divided according to three common characteristics: those made in the studio, those of a family and those that contain children in social events. Some of them fit into more than one category, being decided that they belonged to the one that had greater relevance for the analysis. Within the divisions, the photographs of each group were analyzed in sets taking into consideration their themes (such as images with the presence of items related to the world of adults or taken in the classroom), aiming at noticing similarities and differences, presences and absences, which contribute to the identification of how the child was, whether deliberately or not, represented in the photographs made during the period in which the three Czamanski brothers worked with photography in the state of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil.