I am launching this newsletter now because we live in a confluence moment where traditional knowledge meets environmental science, where contemporary art intersects with Indigenous activism, and where museum practices are being decolonized in real-time.

As a trained anthropologist and documentarian, as well as a curator and research consultant for major exhibitions on Amazonian cultures, I witness daily how these new narratives are emerging in museums, galleries, academic research, and indigenous-led media. Yet the entanglement between these powerful counter-narratives is rarely something we find in the readings of the actual knowledge and artistic production on and from Amazonia.

I am writing this newsletter from a Brazilian Amazonian perspective. For five centuries, Brazil has been stuck with the same devastating script. Back in 1500, Portuguese explorers wrote to their crown describing the recently “discovered" lands as a "Paradise" where "anything you plant would flourish." Sounds nice, right? Except this "fertile paradise" fantasy revealed their complete inability to see the forest's actual fertility. Our history, from then until the present, is one of ignoring our forests and their inhabitants, in the name of failed attempts to create a European landscape in the "new world."

This foundational misunderstanding launched centuries of extractivism that nearly wiped out pau-Brasil trees while destroying 93% of the Atlantic Forest, turning 50% of the Cerrado into farmland, and consuming 20% of the Amazon forest coverage (just in the last fifty years).

This "forest-mining narrative"—as João Moreira Salles recently called it— has environmental and human impacts, since it historically treats Indigenous people as disposable workers, valued only for their forest knowledge that could be exploited for resource grabbing. The same story keeps playing on repeat: just watch Alex Pritz's documentary The Territory (2022), and you can see a land grabber telling the camera that Brazil was built by men like him, “who entered Indigenous lands to make them productive."

But here's the thing: since Brazil's 1988 constitution finally recognized Indigenous and other minorities’ rights, something beautiful has been happening. Indigenous, Quilombola, and Ribeirinho voices have found a space to reach broader audiences, shifting the narrative from one of historical predation to one of a world full of unseen symbiosis. As Indigenous thinker Ailton Krenak puts it: "We are the environment"—there's no separation between humans and the living organism that is Earth.

I believe that when we change the story, we change the possibilities. So, Confluences was designed as a knowledge exchange platform that curates Amazonian perspectives for global audiences. Here, I will try to translate complex research into accessible stories, connect themes that often don't talk to each other, and help build networks between communities, scholars, and cultural institutions worldwide.

That is why I prefer to say that this isn't just a newsletter—it's a community dedicated to protecting Amazonia by transforming how the world understands it.

The Schedule: One comprehensive edition every other week, hitting your inbox on Fridays.

What's Inside: Each edition features either a News Threads (our curated take on the recent Amazonian's biggest moments news) and/or the Fresh Streams section (spotlighting the most interesting scientific, artistic, and curatorial works made in/on this region). From time to time, we will also publish the Forest Floor, a series of interviews with Indigenous artists, environmental and social researchers, museum curators, and filmmakers, and the Canopy Critique, our review of past books, exhibitions, and artworks.

The Extras: The newsletter is also a place where three special collections will grow over time—Basic Amazonian Facts (essential info about the region to satiate your intellectual hunger), Confluence Lexicon (key terms definitions for cross-cultural dialogue), and Forest Memes (a collection of great ideas in the format that follows the spirit of our times).

Everything is free, and will stay free because I believe in accessible knowledge sharing. Eventually, I'll add optional paid subscriptions for supporters who want to help me grow this project.

The old story says Amazonia is an empty space waiting to be developed. The new story reveals it as the most biodiverse and culturally complex region on Earth, home to people who've been environmental stewards for millennia.

Which story will shape the next century?

Welcome to Confluences.