The Secret of Rosário do Milho Verde Chapel

Abstract

Starting from the evidence that there is very little documentation about the “Nossa Senhora do Rosário” Chapel, in Milho Verde (Minas Gerais-Brazil), the author of the article got astonished by the fact – confirmed by several old residents of the place – that its construction was not performed in the nineteenth century, as many specialists believed, but in the 1950’s. This verification has motivated a reflection about the “authenticity” of the building, which, unlike several Brazilian countryside constructions of the same period, does not present any “kitsch” characteristics. It has raised the hypothesis that this feature is due to the complete isolation of the town in the fifties. It did not have even electricity, and therefore, could not share the information of the culture industry of that time. That is probably why the building kept immune to the “kitsch style”, so peculiar in Brazilian country towns in that decade.