‘Brazil is a racist country, statistically’: Luedji Luna, the bold voice of Bahia

Amid hostile rhetoric from her president, the singer is trying to foreground community and love in her new, rapturously received album

Among the wealth of images in the beautiful new visual album" by Brazilian singer Luedji Luna - her swimming underwater pregnant, dancing with strangers during a street carnival in her native Salvador, crying alone - one shot lingers in the mind. A phrase in Portuguese spray-painted on a wall: Black women are the revolution."

Bom Mesmo E Estar Debaixo D'Agua (It's Really Good to Be Underwater), replete with references to Afro-Brazilian religion, Black feminism, love, revenge and celebration, is one of the most rapturously reviewed albums in her country this year. It's an album that talks about me, that is about me," she says over a video call, but I also bring other voices and images of Black women. Because it is an I' that is an us', that is collective."