The story of Globo’s latest telenovela, Velho Chico (Old Chico), begins on the banks of Brazil’s Rio São Francisco, where two families have long been fighting over its waters and resources.

Velho Chico airs Mondays through Saturdays at 9 p.m., and tells the story of a man and a woman from rival families who fall in love in spite of their families’ mutual hatred of each other.

“It is the … story of our country and its people, a declaration of love for our territory, told with a Brazilian emotion that is deeply ours,” says Luiz Fernando Carvalho, the telenovela’s director

As part of this tribute, Globo shot the construction of an actual piece of art for the series’ opening titles: a 1.8-meter by 1-meter wall on which a set of micro-stories are told. The stories are inspired by the legend of Native woman Iati, who fell in love with a warrior and was then separated from him by war. Her tears over losing him formed the Rio São Francisco.

Mariana Sá, creative director at Globo, says “the relevance of the Rio São Francisco, and all of the legends and adventures that have been born on its banks, inspired this opening.”

Alexandre Romano, the titles’ art director, says “we wanted to develop a narrative panel that illustrated the mythological and symbolic universe surrounding the river.”

That’s also why the piece shows a “collaborative work under construction,” which, much like the river, is never really finished.

To accomplish this task, Globo recruited Brazilian painter and illustrator Mello Menezes and illustrator and engraver Samuel Casal.

Menezes, who Romano describes as “a super talented and expert artist who moves easily among different styles, with unbelievable expression in his paint strokes,” had previously worked with Globo.

Casal and “his production [skills]” were selected to complete the work, “which is different from anything seen before. It is more dynamic and modern in the drawing lines and style, without losing … what is primitive and visceral in the shapes,” Romano adds.

The piece starts with the figure of Iati, her tears filling the river. As it flows, the river acquires scales, eventually turning into a serpent, representing men’s greed towards nature. A big fish becomes a school of fish, a nod toward the life the river supports. Finally, entwined men and women symbolize the main characters’ forbidden love.

As Iati cries, “the elements of the river move from the interior to the exterior,” creating a circle that symbolizes the sun, “a key factor in the region,” says Menezes.

Romano says the male and female figures on either side of the piece are “men and women as archetypes, responsible for caring for the surrounding nature.” They are bathed by the rays of sun, representing “the energy of the life as it rises from the river’s center.”

To design the titles, Romano says it was essential to “understand the telenovela’s emotional strength, as well as that of its characters and their relationship with nature.”

That required several meetings with director Carvalho, who was inspired by the arts of South American muralists, artists of Brazilian tropicalia movement, as well as by the colors of the houses and the crafts of the region.

The artists also visited the telenovela’s set in Bahía, “which helped us understand the artistic depth of the work” that Globo was seeking for this piece, says Romano.

Menezes says the brief the two received from Globo invited them to check out the work of “the Brazilian engraver Gilvan Samico as well as the shape, color and beauty of impressionism” for inspiration.

Casal says one of the brief’s goals was to give the artists maximum freedom to create the piece. As a result, he worked “with no previous sketch, practically carving in a spontaneous manner” and choosing to work in medium-density fiberboard (MDF) since it is a medium he knew he could technically dominate.

Casal chose to have that freedom challenged by using a gouge, a tool that does not always behave in a consistent manner while cutting. That forced Casal to “follow his movements like the course of a river looking for ways to flow.”

Globo did not define a color palette for the artists to work in, but Menezes did not want “those liberties to hinder the end result and, instead, only transmit beauty and impact.”

It took five days to shoot the opening, during which time the artists created the piece. Menezes started sketching a drawing in pencil on the board and then covered it in color to generate simple forms.

After that, Casal began using his gouges to carve deeper into the drawings or create new ones stemming from Menezes’ color stains.

In the final stage, Menezes painted in the details. The two developed a rhythmic dialogue that, according to Romano, “flowed with a lot of respect, reinventing and overlapping their styles to work in a more naïf manner, getting closer to the roots that we sought in Brazilian regional arts.”

Filming the piece showed this game of styles step by step. The stages of the work were photographed frame by frame, with some scenes edited in stop motion “to collate parts of the construction and create continuous shots,” says Romano. Hand-held cameras also were used to create the feeling that the viewer is flying over the river, coming in for close-ups to capture the piece’s details.

The piece was accompanied by the song Tropicália, in a version by Caetano Veloso, with musical arrangements by Tim Rescala.

Now completed, the mural will be part of an exhibit at Globo Studios. Globo says it’s a unique opportunity to “understand the union between modern and Tropicália references, between the works by masters such as Portinari, Diego Riviera and Pablo Picasso and Brazilian culture.”

To read this story in Spanish, click here.

CREDITS:

Creative Direction: Sergio Valente, Mariana Sá

Creativity: Alexandre Romano, Christiano Calvet, Roberto Stein, Renan de Moraes.

Direction: Alexandre Romano

Art Direction: Alexandre Romano, Christiano Calvet

Visual Artists: Mello Menezes and Samuel Casal

Native woman Iati: Alexandre Romano

Composition and Digital Animation: Renan de Moraes, Flavio Mac, Gustavo Duval, Felipe Lobo, Wanderson Andre Santos, Alexandre Romano.

Assistant Illustrator: Igor Ching San

Executive Producer: Orlando Martins

Logo Design: Christiano Calvet

Treatment: Carla Sá, Bernardo Magalhães, Suzana Prista, Fabienne Verbicaro

Production and Stop Motion: AnimaKing

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