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Black Helvetia (Swiss Stories 2020, by Dom Smaz) - Swiss Press Award

The brothers Domingos and Ednilson Krull de Souza are descendants of the brothers Ernesto and Francisco Krull, settlers from Germany. In the 1850s, they were among the richest owners of the colony, they had more than a hundred slaves to work their land.
Dom Smaz
The brothers Domingos and Ednilson Krull de Souza are descendants of the brothers Ernesto and Francisco Krull, settlers from Germany. In the 1850s, they were among the richest owners of the colony, they had more than a hundred slaves to work their land.
Photo / Swiss Stories
2020

Black Helvetia

Dom Smaz

Helvécia is a former colony founded 200 years ago by Swiss and German immigrants in northeastern Brazil. It became an important coffee production with the strength of 2000 slaves, until the abolition of slavery in 1888. Some colons descendants still lives there, where the majority of the population are of African descendants. However, evangelicals still brand afro-descendant culture as evil.

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Black Helvetia

Photo / Swiss Stories
2020

Dom Smaz

Helvécia is a former colony founded 200 years ago by Swiss and German immigrants in northeastern Brazil. It became an important coffee production with the strength of 2000 slaves, until the abolition of slavery in 1888. Some colons descendants still lives there, where the majority of the population are of African descendants. However, evangelicals still brand afro-descendant culture as evil.

Author
Dom Smaz / Swiss Press Award

Dom Smaz

Photographer, Lausanne, 1983

DOM SMAZ is a Swiss-Brazilian photographer who is based in Lausanne (Switzerland), although he often works in Brazil. He won six Swiss Press Awards and for some ten years now has regularly contributed to both the national and international press, including The Times, The Sunday Times, The Guardian, Die Zeit, Le Temps, Neue Zürcher Zeitung and Tages Anzeiger. His photographs often deal with themes of colonial heritage, social differences and marginalization. In 2022, his first book Helvécia. A Swiss Colonial History in Brazil was published by Lars Müller Publishers, followed by a monographic exhibition at the Musée d Ethnographie de Genève (MEG), attended by over 13,000 visitors. In 2023, his book was one of three shortlisted for the prestigious English Kraszna-Krausz Book Awards. Then Smaz was rewarded again by the Swiss Press Photo for his work about Helvécia, winning 2nd place in the Swiss Stories category. Since 2019, Smaz is a member of the French photographic agency Hans Lucas.

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