Realm of the Dead: An Installation Performance

Abstract

In The Realm of the Dead, Rogério M. Pinto tells a story of deep and abiding grief, of gender nonconformity, and of the struggles, fears, and eventual accommodations of an immigrant. In the winter of 1966, when Pinto was 10 months old, his three-year-old sister was killed by a bus outside the family’s home in Belo Horizonte, Brazil. Gradually, with no explicit discussion, the little boy came to replace the little girl. He was dressed in her clothes. Like his sisters, he was molested by his father. In 1987, he made an impromptu trip to the United States with friends. His dead sister came, too. When he decided to stay, she did, too. In The Realm of the Dead, she is at last laid to rest.