Beauty in Black and White? Race, Beauty, and the 1926 Fox Film Photogenic Beauty Contest in Brazil

In 1926, the Fox Film Corporation held a “Masculine and Feminine Photogenic Beauty Contest” to find Hollywood’s newest “Latin” star in Brazil and other countries. North American film representatives asked for contestants who were “white with Latin blood.” The exotic allure of this racialized category contradicted Brazilian elites’ preference for eugenic, chaste, white beauty. Brazilian film critics, advertisers, and beauty contestants negotiated transnational standards of beauty as they sought faces, bodies, and sexual appeal that would conquer Hollywood. Ultimately, Brazilian films intellectuals forged their own meanings of “white with Latin blood” even as they upheld the supremacy of white beauty. However, the contest demonstrates how the transnational contours of cinema offered a liminal space for competing standards of racialized beauty in Brazil. Resumen Em 1926, para descobrir um novo astro “Latin,” a Fox Film Corporation lancou no Brasil e em outros paises “O Concurso da Belleza Photogenica Feminina e Varonil.” Os representantes norte-americanos pediram que os concorrentes fossem “brancos com sangue latino.” O encanto exotico dessa categoria racializada ia contra a preferencia das elites brasileiras pela beleza eugenica, pura e branca. Cinefilos, anunciantes e concorrentes negociaram padroes transnacionais de beleza enquanto buscavam rostos e corpos atraentes que conquistariam o Hollywood. No final, cinefilos brasileiros construiram seus proprios sentidos de “branco com sangue latino,” ainda que reforcando a supremacia da beleza branca. No entanto, o concurso revela como o aspecto transnacional do cinema oferecia um espaco temporario dos padroes contraditorios da beleza racializada no Brasil.