The Botanical Garden of Rio de Janeiro (JBRJ) opens tomorrow (27), at 11 am, the exhibition The Botanical Garden and the Belgian Expedition in Brazil 1922-23, which reveals to the public reproductions of a significant part of the historical collection of photographs of the Instituto de Researches Jardim Botânico do Rio and other items from the expedition led by botanist Jean Massat,. There will also be an exhibition of images from current expeditions that show the continuity of field research on the equipment of the Ministry of the Environment. The exhibition will be open until September 27, at the Galpão das Artes in the Botanical Garden of Rio, from 9 am to 5 pm, daily. Entry is free.
The images on display are reproductions of photographs produced by Belgian biologists who were in Brazil 100 years ago, bound for the Amazon. Along with the travel reports, which are among the rare works in the JBRJ Library, the images constitute a valuable scientific heritage.
The exhibition’s curator, Alda Heizer, a historian and researcher affiliated with the JBRJ, said that the greatest legacy of the Belgian mission was the set of textual and imagery information about the flora and fauna of Brazil in the 1920s. “The interaction with the researchers of the JBRJ was important in several aspects, especially regarding the scientific interest of the expedition”, said Alda, in an interview with Brazil Agency.
According to her, the reports and images made by the members of the mission can contribute to the deepening of the knowledge of current researchers, Brazilian or not, about our country, especially about the Amazon.
“The reports present descriptions of inhabitants, places, landscapes and the daily life of the places they visited. The content may interest researchers from other areas of knowledge. The photographs and captions are authored by biologists, which makes them more interesting from an ethnographic, historical and botanical point of view. The Amazon was of special interest to the mission and it even became a doctoral thesis of one of the biologists, the young Belgian Raymond Bouillenne”, informed Alda Heizer.
With the exhibition, the Botanical Garden intends to publicize to the public the importance of its image collection and the fact that the institution, since the first half of the 20th century, has organized and carried out scientific expeditions to different parts of the country.
big themes
The exhibition is organized around six major themes: the organization of the Belgian mission and the role of the Botanical Garden in its achievement; the scientific trips they made in the state of Rio de Janeiro before traveling to other federative units until reaching the Amazon; the scientific importance of the expedition; the scientific photographic collection from the expedition, with the presentation of some originals in glass, and the production of scientific knowledge in the field until the present day.
Historically, the Botanical Garden of Rio de Janeiro, through its researchers, has as one of its functions to develop fieldwork and maintain exchanges with Brazilian and foreign institutions.
Considered a contribution to the study of the biogeography of Brazil by the European researchers and professors who analyzed the results of the trip, the Belgian expedition especially highlighted the relevance of research on the Amazon, a region that had been little studied until then.
The mission was considered by his contemporaries as the extension of a vast movement of botanical interest, on the part of Belgium, which was present at the beginning of the 19th century, with the trips to Brazil carried out by the also Belgian Van Houte, in 1834.
specialists
Belgian biologists in fieldwork, 1922 – Publicity/Rio de Janeiro Botanical Garden
In mid-1922, a group of young biologists, specialists in botany and zoology, left Anvers, Belgium, headed for Brazil, some of them linked to the University of Brussels and others to the Léo Errera Botanical Garden, at the same university. The group was made up of Jean Massart, professor and director of the Léo Errera Botanical Institute at the University of Brussels and coordinator of the trip; Raymond Bouillenne, botanist at the University of Liége; botanists Paul Ledoux and Albert Navez and zoologist Paul Brien, from the University of Brussels.
Conceived by the physician and biologist Jean Massart, recognized as a pioneer in nature conservation in Belgium, the expedition extended to different places in Brazil and aimed to study the fauna and flora and collect objects for demonstration in university courses. The Belgian mission trips took place in several stages: Rio de Janeiro; Sao Paulo; Minas Gerais and Bahia; Pernambuco, Ceará, Pará and Amazonas.
In a conference at the Royal Society of Medical and Natural Sciences in Brussels, Massart summarized the description of his trip to Brazil, highlighting the welcome received from government authorities and scientists from different places and institutions.
“We disembarked in Rio, on August 16, 1922, after three stopovers of a few days in Recife and Bahia (…) and then we were welcomed by the local administrative authorities”.
In the city of Rio de Janeiro, Jean Massart and the other members of the mission stayed at the Botanical Garden for five weeks: “A large laboratory (…) was placed at our disposal, which allowed us to enjoy the wonderful collections of the Garden” .
Trips
The sleeping car that served as a hotel between Bahia, Aramiru, Itumirim and Juazeiro | Photo by R. Bouillenne, 1922 – Publicity/Rio de Janeiro Botanical Garden
Planned and directed by the scientists of the Botanical Garden – Antonio Pacheco Leão (director of the institution) and João Geraldo Kuhlmann, among others, the trips of the Belgian mission were initially carried out for one day to Jacarepaguá, Barra da Tijuca and Piratininga. ; to the islands of Guanabara Bay and the Tijuca forest. The naturalists also went to Xerém, with Adolpho Lutz, from the Manguinhos Institute; and Deodoro, with Arséne Puttemans, a Belgian botanist linked to the Brazilian Ministry of Agriculture. All these trips were recorded by Belgian biologists, said curator Alda Heizer.
The exhibition design direction is by Mary Paz Guillen. Excerpts from the Belgian report were used, together with texts that were produced by JBRJ specialists: History (Alda Heizer), Ethnobotany (Viviane Stern da Fonseca-Kruel); Itatiaia (Claudia Barros), Amazônia (Rafaela Campostrini Forzza) and scientific photography (Raul Ribeiro).
During the month of August, the JBRJ will promote conversation circles with specialists on photography and scientific expeditions, in addition to workshops with the Environmental Education team.
