FROM CANVAS TO ANOMIE the attack on Di Cavalcanti's mural and the dangers to collective memory

o ataque ao painel de Di Cavalcanti e os perigos para a memória coletiva

Abstract

The article analyzes the mutilation of Di Cavalcanti's work 'As Mulatas/Mulheres na Varanda', which occurred two years ago during the anti-democratic acts of January 8, 2023, as an attack on Brazilian collective memory. The study uses Panofsky's iconographic methodology and relates the vandalism to Durkheim and Merton's concept of anomie, characterized by the disintegration of social norms. The research examines the artwork as an iconographic document that celebrates the Afro-descendant presence in Brazilian cultural formation, despite the contradictions present in its racialized title, and demonstrates how Di Cavalcanti's representation of Black women broke with Eurocentric patterns, even amid the ambiguities of Brazilian modernism. From the perspective of Information Science (IS), the article interprets the painting as an iconographic document/informational interface loaded with historical, memorialistic, and political meanings. The work concludes that the destruction of cultural assets transcends material damage, constituting an attack on cultural plurality and national memory, and warns of the need to protect these symbols as a way of preserving democracy itself.