Marguerita in the Air: ABI Brazilian PressAssociation

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M

O Rebu - drawings by Marguerita Bornstein

Here few drawings  from my artwork,

created for  the title sequence of the soap opera in 1974.

 In fact,written by the playwright Braulio Pedroso,known for his political theatre satires, the O REBU remained to these days the most sophisticated novela on Brazilian TV.

 I was 24 years old,already working and published in the Brazilian press since !960,when I was 10.

 At that time,Brazilian women  of a certain class women did not work or worse,looked down if they dared to be independent or in fact make a living  through their art.

 Worse even if  a woman displayed an intellect or a mind.

 So I ,n consequence for being avant garde and outspoken,and yes a legitimate talent,no tricks or shortcuts,became a target left and right.

 My sin,was my passion,my integrity and my desire to make the world laugh.

 And,oh yeah,the public from north and south of the country gave me a feedback,except the "macho" set,that felt their feathers ruffled,as the cartoonist in chief,at the time,who considered his kingdom off limits for women.

His frustrated  brother saw to follow me since my teen ager days, by

setting me up to be raped and then years later follow me across the world to destroy my  personal and professional reputation.

 When my work was published in Zurich,in GRAPHIS,this man,had the audacity to go there and spread lies to the publisher Walter Herdeg.

 Herdeg,himself did not buy his mendacity,but in the interim,as Herdeg himself introduced me to Georges Dargaud,Claude Moliterni  in Paris, who both offered me  contracts to proceed with my drawings and Louis Silverstein,the Managing Editor of The New York Times, everyone  end up finding themselves in some strange controversy,which I only found out, after the damage perpetrated.

Robert Hughes,the art critic vouched for me,as well as Milton Glaser and Herb Lubalin.

 All recognized my original and

individual talent.

Besides my graphic experience,designing newspapers,advertising campaigns,magazines,fine artist,

 I also had two Humor pages,running in national magazines in Brazil,where I also received ennumerous art awards,as well as here in the US,despite being blacklisted.

 

 In 1976, when I found myself stranded in New York,with my mother as my dependent,I become traumatized.

I could not fathom what was happening.

My only  passport for survival,my raison d'etre,after leaving Brazil for suffering injustice there, I found myself in a kafkaesque saga,which I so far did not overcome.

Just because I REFUSED,the "casting couch".

 My drawings,hilarious  on  a stage  where Censorship and Torture were rampant,when  people,journalists,artists,writers and musicians were persecuted,become  along with its creator,me,a young woman,who depended solely on my artwork for survival ,a threat.

 Of course,had I been brought up,by parents with no sense of dignity, I would have used my glamorous self to fiddle around my suitors.

 My parents,both brilliant and wonderful survivors of Hitler's attack on humanity,strssed in me to own myself and never to cave in.

 Ha! Nie Daj cie!!! as my father's last words before he fell into a deep coma,leaving me and my mother to fend for our lives.

 I only hope that my art will pull me back to the path I was on and allow me to work and earn a living.

After all,we are observing that the world.thanks to technology is teari ng the shrouds of violence against women and exposing  at last some of the outrageous indignities that one suffers for being a true self.

 Enough of Waiting for Godot....

 Time to go back on the scene,as I spend too long ,years in limbo,subjected to lies and lies .

 So here I am asking for my human rights.

 Marguerita Bornstein

 P.S In March recent I was included in a exhibit for ABI

 Associacao Brasileira da Imprensa, in Rio de Janeiro.

Something to Be Applied Anywhere

“The old Jewish joke tells about a bridegroom, who demanded, a minute before stepping under the wedding canopy, that the bride be undressed for his sake. One does not say no to a bridegroom. She was undressed for him, and then he said: I don’t like her nose.”

"To remove themselves from the mechanisms of disgrace by becoming observers.” [2]

drawing firstpublished in The NYTimes
We all want to be observers. We want to be above the fray, above the pain, above having to deal.
Why?
Because we don’t think our­selves mentally tough enough to take on the world as it is. We believe—because we have been taught to believe —that we are inadequate to the tasks at hand. We don’t want to feel guilty for environmental disasters not of our own making. We don’t want to feel sad for people starving in Africa. We don’t want to have to take on any burdens other than our own, because the problems seem too big, the insanity unsolvable.
?- note from TPF

The importance of those notions has been eclipsed by greater urgencies. We live in a challenged, confused and subverted world. We don’t need to put any burrs under any saddles. We have enough burrs for a lifetime. We have enough distance.
The great challenge now is to find relationship.
http://www.stepinsidedesign.com/STEPMagazine/Article/28843