In a collaborative museology initiative, the InDigit project team, coordinated by Rodrigo Lacerda (CRIA) and Elisabete Pereira (IHC), organised a workshop at the National Museum of Ethnology (NME) with Kanawayuri Marcello Kamaiurá and Auakamu Kamayurá, representatives of the Kamayurá Archive, of the Kamayurá indigenous people (Alto Xingu, Brazil), consultants and co-researchers of InDigit.

The two-day workshop centred on the collection obtained in 1964 by Victor and Françoise Bandeira during a visit to the Ypavu village of the Kamayurá people, as part of the couple’s trip to Latin America to collect elements of material culture for the then project of an Overseas Ethnology Museum (today the NME). Hosted by the NME, the workshop allowed the participants to contextualise the collection in greater detail and reflect on archival practices, museography, and artefact conservation together with the Kamayurá representatives. For Kanawayuri and Auakamu, this was also an opportunity to learn about the conservation techniques used at the museum and to take part in discussions about conservation regimes — which include considerations about visuality (what should and shouldn’t be seen, and by whom), ways of displaying objects and access policies.

The main aim of InDigit, an exploratory project funded by IN2PAST, is to examine the differences and similarities between the theories and practices of the NME and the Kamayurá in terms of classification systems, access protocols, concepts of ownership, care regimes, and notions of temporality. The expected outputs are the development of a prototype digital repository based on the NME’s Kamayurá collection, developed in collaboration and according to the perspectives of the Kamayurá people; the joint writing of a manual with recommendations from the Kamayurá on the management of their people’s collections, both in physical and digital formats; and the publication of a scientific article reflecting on the project.

In addition to the InDigit coordinators, the workshop was attended by the director of the NME, Gonçalo de Carvalho Amaro  (also a researcher at the IHC), several members of the museum team, Luísa Valentini (CNPq / UFBA), who has been supporting the Kamayurá Archive project for over 10 years, and anthropologist João Leal (CRIA). Rodrigo Lacerda emphasised that ‘this work not only demonstrates the current importance of ethnographic museums and the collections they preserve for the communities of origin, but also illustrates how these institutions can renew and reinvent themselves through these intersections of experiences’.

Rita Hasse Ferreira (IN2PAST) contributed to this article.

Photo: (From left to right) Kanawayuri Marcello Kamaiurá, Elisabete Pereira, and Auakamu Kamayurá (© Iria Simões, National Museum of Ethnology / Photographic Documentation Archive / Museums and Monuments of Portugal, E.P.E.)