A Day in the Life: Brazil Election Day

A Day in the Life: Brazil Election Day

One woman. One journey. One vote.

A Sunday in October

It is raining in São Paulo, and we are travelling in an Uber towards Perus, where a woman is going to cast her vote in the second round of Brazil’s presidential election. English and American pop music from the 1980s plays through the car speakers. I have brought my camera, although I have not set out to photograph a political rally or a crowd. I want to see what happens when one person undertakes an ordinary journey for a specific civic purpose.

Election days are familiar photographic territory. There are the queues, the flags, the occasional argument, the politicians surrounded by microphones and the supporters waiting for a result. Such photographs have a place in news coverage. But they also leave much of the day outside the frame. Most voters do not arrive surrounded by an audience. They have to get to the polling station, fit the journey around other obligations and return to the rest of their lives afterwards.

For this woman, the journey includes Perus, a neighbourhood to which her family has been connected for more than fifty years. We are going to a family home before travelling onwards to vote. It is not a direct journey from one front door to a ballot box. Her mother votes at one polling place; later, her father, sister and the woman I am following vote at another. This difference will become clearer as the day proceeds.

I am interested in what my photographs will actually establish. A person travelling in an Uber could be on almost any errand. The circumstances of the day give the images their subject, but a camera cannot automatically turn every expression or gesture into evidence of political feeling. There is a difference between recording what I saw and explaining what I assume it meant.

Continue Reading  A Day In The Life Election Day English