Breaking the Circuit of Control –
Field Research in Brazil | April 20 – May 26, 2025 |
MAC USP (Museum of Contemporary Art of the University of São Paulo), Teatro de Cultura Artística, São Paulo Biennial Archive, Instituto Sedes Sapientiae, Juqueri Complex, Osório César Art Museum, Bispo do Rosário Museum, Polo Experimental, Museu de Imagens do Inconsciente, Hospital Colônia de Barbacena, Museu da Loucura (Museum of Madness).
MAC USP (Museum of Contemporary Art of the University of São Paulo)
Museum of Images of the Unconscious (Museu de Imagens do Inconsciente)
From April 20 to May 26, artist Francesco Bertocco and curators Mariagrazia Muscatello and Gabi Scardi will travel through Brazil on a research and production journey as part of the international art project Breaking the Circuit of Control, which will unfold throughout 2025. The project investigates the legacy of Italian psychiatrist Franco Basaglia and his influence on contemporary understandings of psychiatry, institutional critique, and the role of visual culture in relation to manipulation of individuals and the reconstruction of collective memory.
Fieldwork, filming, and archival research will take place in São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, and Barbacena, focusing on key institutions, historical sites, and individuals linked to the history and social relevance of psychiatric reform.
The team will be in São Paulo from April 22 to May 10, 2025, and will visit:
- MAC USP (Museum of Contemporary Art of the University of São Paulo) for the project presentation and a public conference on April 24, followed by research activities.
- Teatro de Cultura Artística, one of the venues where Basaglia gave public lectures in 1979, on April 25.
- São Paulo Biennial Archive, for research on April 22.
- Instituto Sedes Sapientiae, a key center for mental health discourse, on May 5.
- Juqueri Complex and the Osório César Art Museum, former psychiatric institutions visited by Basaglia himself, on May 6.
In Rio de Janeiro, the following events will take place:
- Bispo do Rosário Museum and Polo Experimental, located in the former Colônia Juliano Moreira, for research and photography on April 29.
- Museum of Images of the Unconscious, founded by Nise da Silveira and crucial to rethinking psychiatric treatment through art, for research and photography on April 30.
The journey continues to Barbacena (Minas Gerais) on May 2 and 3, where the team will visit the Hospital Colônia de Barbacena and the Museum of Madness (Museu da Loucura) to document one of the most painful legacies of psychiatric institutionalization in Brazil.
Throughout the trip, the team will collect photographic and video materials, conduct interviews, and reflect on the intersections between the history of psychiatry, spatial politics, and resistance movements that shaped new approaches to care and dignity.
A photographic journal of the research trip will be regularly updated on our website and social media—follow the team as we wish them a successful mission in Brazil!
MORE ABOUT THE PROJECT
Obalne galerije Piran, which leads the project, was awarded the prestigious Italian Council Award 2024, granted by Italy’s Ministry of Culture through its international open call program for creative projects.
Breaking the Circuit of Control by Francesco Bertocco is a project presented by Obalne Galerije Piran under the direction of Mara Ambrožič Verderber, who also curates the exhibition alongside Gabi Scardi and Mariagrazia Muscatello. The project has been made possible through collaborations with numerous institutions, which Obalne galerije Piran (Coastal Galleries Piran) successfully partnered in the past years.
International partners of the project include: MART – Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art of Trento and Rovereto, Museum of Contemporary Art of the University of São Paulo, University of Paris 8, Paris, NITJA Center for Contemporary Art (Norway), ICA Milano Foundation, Academy of Visual Arts in Gdańsk and others.
An exhibition featuring the photography and video work of artist Francesco Bertocco will be on view in the fall at Loža Gallery in Koper. In addition to presentations across Europe, the project will include various stops in Slovenia, where public screenings, discussions, and debates on the project’s themes will be organized in collaboration with key national institutions.
CONTENT PRESENTATION
Breaking the Circuit of Control is a project by artist Francesco Bertocco, known for his research on the history of medicine and therapeutic practices. The work focuses on Franco Basaglia, the influential Italian psychiatrist and reformer whose radical ideas challenged institutional psychiatry. Basaglia’s critique of coercive treatments and the notion of psychiatric “dangerousness” helped ignite a global anti-institutional movement that redefined mental health care.
Bertocco’s project centers on Basaglia’s 1979 journey to Brazil, particularly his visit to Juqueri, once one of the world’s largest psychiatric hospitals. Located fifty kilometers from São Paulo, Juqueri housed up to 100,000 patients between 1918 and 1990. Though now closed, the institution was fully active when Basaglia visited. His trip also included stops at the Colônia Hospital in Barbacena, the Instituto Sedes Sapientiae, the Teatro de Cultura Artística in São Paulo, and the University Hospital in Belo Horizonte. During this tour, he met with leading figures in Brazilian psychiatry and delivered a series of influential lectures.
These lectures were later published in Brazilian Conferences, a work that captures both the urgency and the humanist passion of Basaglia’s thought. His visit to Brazil was partly inspired by the powerful pen-and-ink portraits of Juqueri patients created in the early 1950s by Italian artist and designer Roberto Sambonet. These haunting images had a profound effect on Basaglia, symbolizing the violence of institutional marginalization.
Even before this journey, Basaglia had been deeply influenced by Latin American thinkers such as Paulo Freire, author of Pedagogy of the Oppressed. He aligned himself with the region’s broader emancipatory movements, including public protests against authoritarian regimes—among them the 1974 Venice Biennale demonstration in solidarity with Chile, in which he participated.
Bertocco’s project revisits Basaglia’s Brazilian journey through photography and video installation. By documenting Juqueri and staging scenes that evoke Basaglia’s methods, the work explores themes central to his legacy: the perception and treatment of mental illness, the architecture of total institutions, and the role of infrastructure in shaping systems of control. It also reflects on the concept of confinement as a mechanism for excluding those deemed abnormal or dangerous. The spatial isolation of Juqueri—closer to the forest than the city—epitomizes this logic of exclusion.
Breaking the Circuit of Control draws on the involvement of several Brazilian institutions engaged in ongoing debates around psychiatry and collective memory. Through a lens that intertwines past and present, Bertocco revisits a pivotal moment of cross-continental dialogue and critical resistance, honoring Basaglia’s belief that real change is possible.
Content by: Gabi Scardi, Mara Ambrožič Verderber, Mariagrazia Muscatello.
