Bruno de Oliveira Jayme: Art, Activism, and the Power of Creative Dissent

On this episode of Humans, On Rights, we sit down with Bruno de Oliveira Jayme, a Brazilian-born artist, educator, and community arts practitioner who has spent 25 years making Canada his home. Now a full professor in the Faculty of Education at the University of Manitoba, Bruno brings together curriculum theory, arts-based research, and a deep commitment to social justice. His work explores what happens when art stops being decoration and starts becoming dissent.Bruno introduces us to the concept of "artivism" — the intersection of art and activism — and makes the case that creative expression is not a softer substitute for protest, but a distinct and powerful tool for surfacing stories, building collective identity, and opening space for conversations that more traditional forms of advocacy often can't reach.We're discussing:How Bruno's upbringing in Brazil during the end of a military dictatorship first opened his eyes to art as a political forceThe roots of community art and artivism in the social movements of the late 1960s and '70s — from the Black movement and second-wave feminism to the landless movement in Latin AmericaWhy art is uniquely capable of addressing difficult issues "in a light manner" — and why that accessibility matters for movements like environmental justiceHis advice to aspiring artivist students: start with what you know, what you're struggling with, what you're hopeful for. Bring that to your community, and think together, collectively, about what you can do next.Bruno's website (edited)