PhD project: “Guardiões da Floresta: Ilustração na Construção de Narrativas para a Justiça Ambiental”
Reference: 2025.02873.BD
Scientific area: Sociology
Supervisors: Paula Guerra (IS-UP); Júlio Dolbeth (FBAUP)
Timeline: November 2025 - September 2029
Abstract: This project investigates the role of illustration as a critical and regenerative tool in constructing visual narratives for environmental justice in forest contexts affected by fires and cultural erasures. Through a comparative analysis between the Leiria Pine Forest (Portugal) and the Atlantic Forest (Brazil), it proposes an art-based and participatory approach that integrates visual storytelling, affective mapping, and co-creation processes with local communities. In this project, illustration is understood as an ontoaesthetic language capable of mediating emotions, knowledge, and memories in territories marked by devastation. The project brings together the fields of design, illustration, and sociology, and aims to produce illustrated publications, a manifesto, a best practices manual, academic papers, and an educational video—all made available on a digital platform. It contributes to the fields of social design studies, eco-activism, and symbolic regeneration, proposing an interdisciplinary research model with scientific, cultural, and environmental impact
