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Noemisa Batista dos Santos was born in Ribeirão da Capivara, in the area of Caraí, in 1946. Her pieces moulded in clay got famous in Brazil and abroad. “I’ve always worked with clay. My mother used to make pots and suddenly I thought of the dolls. I worked hard and looked after our smallholding. Today I have a sister who is very ill and needs attention, and I can’t work as much. When needed, I ask for help. I teach people how to mould and put the finishing touches.” Noemisa lives on the same smallholding where she was born, isolated from everything and everyone – there are 6 km between her and the nearest road. “I do what I can. I’m by myself and the land demands a lot of time, and then there is the clay. Whenever I have any clay work I sell it, but that doesn’t happen all the time.” Considered to be as important in Minas Gerais as Master Vitalino is in the Northeast, Noemisa’s work has always impressed people with the detail and the sophisticated painted decoration. Her latest pieces are simpler, smaller, perhaps because of commercial demands. This doesn’t make them less precious, the pure expression of the feelings of a woman who, despite all the hardships she faces in her life, manages to see poetry and beauty around her. |
