Thales Bretas launches Instituto Paulo Gustavo in Rio

Thales Bretas, the widower of Brazilian comedian Paulo Gustavo, has founded the Instituto Paulo Gustavo to organise, preserve and disseminate the artist's legacy. The institute is running a month-long programme of artistic activities at Casa de Cultura Laura Alvim in Rio de Janeiro this month.

The initiative follows strong public response to an earlier exhibition at the Museu de Arte Contemporânea (MAC). Bretas said the institute grew out of a need to give meaning to grief and turn loss into purpose. He also said Paulo Gustavo's work carried a distinctive power of social acceptance, helping families better understand same-sex relationships.

What does the institute change for the family?

For Bretas, a dermatologist raising the couple's two sons, Gael and Romeu, the project runs alongside a more private struggle: managing collective grief in front of children who were one and a half years old when their father died. He described how emotional reactions from strangers in the street — hugs, tears — can confuse the boys.

Bretas said he faces questions about his capacity to raise children as a man. "O luto do homem gay ainda é uma coisa confusa na cabeça das pessoas," he said, noting that he occupies neither of the traditional social roles of widow or widowered man.

He has chosen not to show his sons on social media, aiming to give them an ordinary childhood. He said he teaches people not to ask for photographs of the children in public places, keeping their image in the private sphere.

Grief as an ongoing process

Bretas described mourning as continuous, with no defined end. He compared his current experience to the loss of his brother in a bus accident when Bretas was 17, defining the pain as a scar that is polished eternally.

The institute's programme at Casa de Cultura Laura Alvim marks its first sustained public activity since the MAC exhibition drew wide attention. Whether the organisation will expand beyond this month's occupation — into archives, education or touring projects — remains unstated in Bretas's account; for now, the institute's stated remit is to organise and preserve, and its concrete footprint is one venue in Rio.