MURAL M1NUTE #2: MADRE by Hanna Lucatelli (Porto Alegre, Brazil)
Where migration, memory, and courage take monumental form!
In Porto Alegre, a 45‑meter figure rises over the future Italian Consulate, not a hero from official archives, but the woman history forgot. In MADRE, artist Hanna Lucatelli brings to the surface “a trace… something left behind, but still pulsing in the present” .
Lucatelli centers the unnamed women of Italian immigration, those who crossed oceans without choosing to, who carried families through fear, labor, and silence. She paints femininity not as decoration but as structure: “a strength that doesn’t need rigidity to be monumental… the ground, the foundation where a new history was planted”.
We took time to talk with Hanna and curator Giulia L. Lupo about this monumetal work which will become a landmark for Porto Alegre.
When you first began imagining MADRE, what was the very first image, emotion, or memory that surfaced for you?
The first image that came through me was a trace... something left behind, but still pulsing in the present. I felt a silent weight, the echo of everything that was never said or recorded in the official histories of immigration. It was an act of reclaiming, as if I needed to give form to a presence that had always been there, but that history insisted on keeping in the shadows.
This mural starts from a deceptively simple question: Who was the woman who crossed the ocean 150 years ago? How did that question guide your early sketches and your emotional approach?
That question led me toward the invisible, toward what happens in the gaps between the great historical facts. In the records, we find many names and references to men, but almost none to women. My emotional search was for the body that sustained the daily life of that crossing and kept memory and traditions alive through every small gesture. The early sketches tried to capture the fear of the unknown, the hope, the courage, and the life that has to continue, in spite of everything.
You’ve said that femininity is a source of inspiration in your work. In MADRE, how did you translate that into form, gesture, or symbolism?
I translated it into a strength that doesn’t need rigidity to be monumental. Her gesture is one of shelter, but also of foundation; it is a body that receives and that projects. Femininity in MADRE is not an ornament, it is the structure itself. She is the ground, the foundation where a new history was planted and cultivated. I used forms that suggest embrace and protection, but that carry the solidity of someone who holds up the world on unstable ground... having to be her own safety.
The mural consciously shifts the narrative of Italian immigration by placing the woman at the center, a figure often marginalized in official memory. What aspects of these women’s stories felt most urgent for you to reclaim?
My intention was to humanize these women, to pull them out of the role of silent supporting characters. It is urgent to remember that, in most cases, they had no power over the decision to leave; they were carried by a choice that was not theirs, but that they had to sustain with their own bodies. To reclaim this history is to speak about the courage of those who cross an ocean in fear, without choice, without preparation, but with an enormous responsibility in their hands. They were the architects of a new existence, the ones who, even without a voice in the decisions, ensured the continuity of life and traditions in a foreign land.
There’s a sense of sacredness in the way you describe this figure, “immense, inevitable.” What makes this woman sacred to you?
The sacred, for me, lies in the almost divine capacity to generate and sustain life in the face of the abyss... and I don’t mean only her children, but herself and everyone she ends up caring for. The inevitable is her presence... the presence of women in the construction of history, even without the power to decide. She is sacred because she is the guardian of affective memory, the force that kept dignity and humanity alive through the hardships of every new beginning.
This mural is 45 meters high, a scale that transforms the city’s skyline. How does working at this magnitude change your creative process or your relationship with the figure you’re painting?
In practical terms, working at this scale demands rigorous technical adaptation... The figure has to be drawn and painted with the ground in mind, with proportions and gestures calibrated to create connection regardless of where the viewer is standing, whether up close, from a distance, from a car, or from a window.
As for the figure herself... I build her gradually, through fragments. She is born at a small scale, in a digital version. The first day of painting feels like the beginning of a labor... I start my ritual and ask permission for her to arrive. I feel her presence, but I cannot see her. From the top of the building, I see only patches of color, textures, and isolated parts. My relationship during the execution is with mystery... The face is always the last thing I paint. It is the moment when the work finally looks back at me and the encounter happens. At that moment I close the ritual and give thanks for having been chosen to bring her to that place.
The mural sits on the future Italian Consulate, in a highly visible part of Porto Alegre. How did the site itself influence your composition, your palette, or the emotional tone of the work?
For murals like this one, in another city, I often have to arrive with an initial project before I’ve ever set foot in the location... especially for bureaucratic approvals. So I try to meditate and stay open to whatever needs to come while I immerse myself in the research. It is an exercise in surrender and trust. When I arrive, I adapt the work to the site in more practical terms, according to the best sightlines, proportions, and the color palette of the surroundings. These days I try to create a painting that feels as though it was always there, as though it grew from that space rather than being imposed upon it, but that is still capable of interrupting the rhythm... creating a counterpoint of silence and permanence within the flow. As for color, I chose tones that wouldn’t shout, colors that would stay. That the work would age alongside the city and continue to make sense many years from now.
When you think about people encountering MADRE from the street, from cars, buses, or on foot, what do you hope their first impression will be?
I hope she stops people in the middle of their path... That someone on their way to work, dropping a child at school, or heading home looks up and feels something they cannot immediately name. I want MADRE to open a crack in the heart. To make people think about the woman beside them, the one who came before, the one who held the family together in silence, the one who had no choice but kept moving forward anyway. I want MADRE to give women back the place that history insisted on erasing: the center. Not as a symbol, but as a real, monumental, and inevitable presence.
Migration is both a historical theme and a deeply contemporary one. How do you see MADRE speaking not only to the past but to the migrant experiences unfolding today?
The pain and courage of leaving are universal and timeless feelings. But when I think about migration today, I also think about a state that many women carry permanently... a constant sense of not belonging, of insecurity, of searching. Women are in migration all the time, not only geographically, but symbolically. Searching for places, spaces, relationships where they can exist with more safety and warmth. Where they don’t have to justify themselves to occupy the space that is already theirs.
MADRE speaks to that as well. About the right to arrive and to stay. About the courage of those who leave without guarantees and rebuild their lives with their own hands. She is a mirror for any woman who has ever felt she needed to move in order to survive, whether crossing an ocean, crossing roads, or crossing herself.
The children beside the central figure represent new generations, life renewed. What did you want these younger figures to express about continuity, identity, or belonging?
The girl in red is not just any child... she is the eldest daughter. The one who already looks forward alongside her mother. The one who already carries in her body the awareness that responsibility also belongs to her. Red is not innocence; it is presence, it is strength, it is the color of someone who has already begun to understand the weight of being a woman in this world.
She represents the silent transmission that happens between women across generations... not through words, but through gestures, glances, and examples lived in the everyday. The mother doesn’t need to explain anything; the daughter already feels it. She already knows that one day it will be her turn to hold what needs to be held.
The other children are the horizon... they are what that crossing made possible. They don’t carry the weight, they don’t know the fear of departure, they don’t know what it cost to get here. And that is exactly as it should be. Because that is precisely what the mother wanted: for them to simply exist, to belong, and to flourish in this land as if it had always been theirs.
This project was conceived with curator Giulia Lavinia Lupo. How did your dialogue with her shape the conceptual direction of the mural?
It was essential to have a woman producer who connects with the act of making art in the same way I do... not only as a creative process, but as a ritual. Giulia understands painting as something that goes beyond technique and aesthetics; she feels the spiritual weight of what is being built. That resonance allowed the project to be carried with a depth that is only possible when two people are willing to go deep together. I feel that we didn’t just produce a mural... we built a portal. And drawing an analogy to the mural itself, Giulia was the boat that gave me the safety to make that crossing. Working with her has always been like that.
The Consulate described this mural as a “gift” to the gaúchos and to the Italian community in Rio Grande do Sul. How did that sense of offering influence your approach?
I received that definition with an immense sense of responsibility. From the beginning, I wanted MADRE to be a work that could reach anyone, regardless of their ancestral history. I sought universal symbols and gestures that could connect those with Italian roots and those without, those who know this history and those who encounter it for the first time on that corner. A true gift does not choose who it moves. My intention was to offer a mirror where anyone could see something of themselves and their own story reflected with depth and poetry.
As an artist, what did you discover about yourself while creating MADRE?
I discovered that my painting is, more and more, an exercise in connection with the invisible and in surrender. MADRE also confirmed to me that to do good work I need to be surrounded by people vibrating at the same frequency, with open hearts.
If the woman in your mural could speak, not to history, but to us today, what do you imagine she would say?
This is the kind of question I prefer to leave unanswered. I believe art is made in that space between the viewer and the work... and I don’t feel I should fill that gap with words. That silence is also part of the work.
And finally: when you step back and look at this towering figure, what do you hope endures? What do you hope future generations will read in her presence?
I hope what endures is the awareness that we are made of courage and of affections that cross oceans, real and symbolic.
About the artist:
HANNA LUCATELLI is a visual artist, muralist, and mother.
Born in São Paulo in 1990, she grew up in an intense and dynamic city that shaped her perspective and way of creating.
Her work stems from a desire to connect, with people, with the city, and with time, creating small moments of pause within the fast pace of everyday life. In her work, the female figure emerges in a strong yet sensitive way: bodies that occupy space, assert their presence, and invite reflection, bringing the feminine closer to the urban environment.
In a simple and personal way, her research seeks to reconstruct the collective imagination around women, representing their strength, courage, and complexity, far from stereotypes or idealizations.
Her work also approaches spirituality and proposes a reconnection with historical references, creating links between memory, territory, and identity. Through an intuitive process, she explores symbols and atmospheres that transcend time, building images that engage with local traditions and sensibilities in a respectful and contemporary way.
For Hanna, art is a form of dialogue. More than painting walls, her practice aims to awaken another kind of attention, more open, more mindful, more human.
Where to find this monumental mural?
If you’re ready to stand beneath MADRE and feel her presence for yourself, finding the mural couldn’t be easier. You can locate it instantly through the free Street Art Cities app or on the website, where the geolocation feature guides you right to the wall from wherever you are. Once you’re there, don’t forget to tap into the social features, mark it as seen, give it a like, and help keep this monumental work alive in the global street art map.
MURAL M1NUTE is a series diving into the stories painted across the globe. Every episode zooms in on one wall, one artist, and one idea that shapes the city’s visual identity. From hidden alleys to iconic facades, we unpack the meaning, the craft, and the community behind each mural, always in under a minute. It’s a fast, accessible way to explore how the street art world speaks through color, texture, and imagination.