Re-reading the photographic archive: The propagandistic staging of the portuguese Estado Novo in the Braga district

Abstract

The article focuses on visual representations of political propaganda in a local context in the early years of the Estado Novo. Braga, the city of the military coup of 28 May 1926, became nationally famous because of its symbolic value, profusely exploited by the government and the local elites. By means of thick description of iconographic material, this study analyses the use of photography in terms of symbolic materialisation, within the processes of circulation and reception of aesthetic and artistic codes fostered and spread by the «politics of spirit».