Villas-Bôas brothers

In 1961 they succeeded in getting the entire upper Xingu legally protected, making it the first massive indigenous area in all South America, and the prototype for dozens of similar reserves all over the continent.

[1] Robin Hanbury-Tenison, from Survival International, wrote in 1971 that "The Xingu is the only closed park in Brazil, which means that it is the only area in which Indians are safe from deliberate or accidental contact with undesirable representatives of Western civilization.

"[3] In the foreword of the book Xingu: the Indians, Their Myths the anthropologist Kenneth S. Brecher wrote that It is now almost 30 years since the Villas-Bôas brothers (...) led the expedition known as 'Brazil's march to the West' which was intended to open up the heart of the interior for colonization.

They were overwhelmed by the beauty and cultural richness of the network of Xingu tribes which they discovered, and when the expedition disbanded they remained in the jungle to protect the Xinguanos from the land speculators, state senators, diamond prospectors, skin hunters, and rubber gatherers who had followed in their wake.

(...) That the Xingu tribes continue to exist, in fact to thrive, is due largely to the extreme dedication, intelligence, cunning, and physical strength of these brothers.

[8] In April 2014 the Brazilian graffiti artist Speto created an extensive artwork dedicated to the Villas-Bôas titled 3 Brothers on 14 concrete pillars of the elevated metro track of Krieau station in Vienna commissioned by Wiener Linien and KÖR Kunst im öffentlichen Raum.

Honoring the brothers' legacy, Speto painted characters from Brazilian mythology like Boitatá, Iara or Boto and tribal pattern designs on the pillars of the subway line.