The Visual Activism of Street Signs and the Legacy of Marielle Franco: Disseminations, Controversies, and Resistance around the Globe

Abstract

This article examines the street signs that carry the name of Brazilian Black Lesbian Leftist politician Marielle Franco, who was killed on March 14, 2018, in what is a still unresolved case. In exploring the many street signs made with her name as a form of protest, remembrance, homage to her legacy and visual activism, I explore what might be considered ‘Franco’s after-life’; a series of visual actions that occurred after her killing. I analyse the emerging context and dissemination of these street signs, their circulation not only on the streets and in leftist protests, but also on social media and in art spaces, and their global reach. I will also address the breaking of Franco’s street sign, as a form of backlash from politicians aligned with far right-wing politics. Franco mobilized intersectional agendas of race, class, geography, gender, and sexuality in her political struggles within parliament, during her term as a minority force in the Rio de Janeiro parliament. I aim to theorize the cultural practices that support the dissemination of these images, the effect of their visuality, and the complex network formed around them. At stake is also the question of visibility, and the circulation of the street signs in an international space, crossing national borders and facing the emergence of far right-wing movements worldwide. This article will foreground the importance of street signs as anonymously produced expressions of collective action and aesthetical-political action. Speaking from global Southern geographies, the analysis also reflects on challenges, visibilities, and erasures of Black Lesbians in different contexts. Lastly, I consider the Marielle Franco street signs as a site of transnational Black feminist theoretical possibility for delineating the diasporic.