Mariana Fraga (maribeatlescolor)
Mariana Fraga is 23 years old, autistic and graduated in Modern Languages – Portuguese and English – and their respective literatures. She was an English teacher for a while but changed her career to have more time to dedicate herself to her studies about John Lennon. Now she works as a producer’s assistant in the marketing and educational fields and dreams of working with official media related to John and his family. She spend her days happily posting about John on social media, lecturing and writing about him. John Lennon is her special interest and also her biggest love.
Anushka Bidani: How did you get into The Beatles?
Mariana Fraga (maribeatlescolor): In 2019 a friend of mine challenged me to listen to the Beatles discography, I didn’t even know who they were besides the band’s name. After listening to the first two albums I was already fascinated, what came after was a treat for my soul.
AB: How did John grow into your favourite?
MF: I’m putting this in a very John way: vibration. It was all vibrations. Paul was my favorite first because that friend who showed me the Beatles had him as her favorite, so we obviously talked about him more frequently. After a few months, I decided to do a quick Google research about John, I didn’t know anything else about him besides his name and that he was no longer with us. Right at that moment I felt a very strong energy, I can’t even say it was because of the information or the pictures that I saw, it all actually happened before I absorbed all of that, it was just something cosmic. It gave me goosebumps and I knew that it was something big. I “ran away” from him for three months, I got too scared of what all of that vibration meant, of how intense that was. My friend finally got me to listen to Imagine, after that there was no going back and I’m forever grateful that I found him and that he found me as well. I always say that he was the missing piece of my life’s puzzle, everything started to make sense once he arrived.
AB: Everyone engages in fandom in a different way. What made you start coloring Beatles’ photos?
MF: I was not satisfied with the colorizations I was seeing online, especially because most of them were done by those automatic colorization apps, so I said to myself “If you want it properly done, you’ve gotta do it yourself” and I dedicated a few months to learn more about it. I think I did a good job, not perfect, but good enough. And now I can colorize any picture I want or need. I haven’t done it in a while because it takes a lot of time and I’ve been busy, but I love it, it is really fun seeing the pictures getting a new light on them.
AB: This is so cool! How did you learn visual editing?
MF: I taught myself! Not sure how, I just kept trying to the point I thought it was acceptable. The first ones looked awful.
AB: You’re also the co-founder of the John Lennon fandom community, The Nowhere Fans. What inspired that?
MF: Love, love is what started all of it. And when you find other people that share the same love, you want to do more, to do bigger. You want to create more love. So while my account, at the beginning, was more focused on being a personal diary, The Nowhere Fans was the more serious one, where news and dynamics would be shared and developed. We also felt that the fandom needed a place where we could all reunite to celebrate John, therefore the name that I created – “The Nowhere Fans” – explains itself, fans of the Nowhere Man, all together in his nowhere land. Some thing’s changed a bit over the years, I also have a more professional approach on my personal accounts now, but The Nowhere Fans remains one of the greatest choices I’ve ever made. I’ve been learning a lot while we dedicate ourselves daily to John.
AB: “The John Lennon legacy dissemination center.” That’s how The Nowhere Fans is described on social media. What does that exactly mean?
MF: I can’t tell you for sure because that sentence was written by the other co-founder, Di. I’m not sure what was her process of thought behind that exact phrase, but I understand what that means: the best way to describe our account is that it is a center of daily tributes and reminders of how important his legacy is, how talking about his work every single day is a way to keep his legacy renewed and to keep John himself with us.
AB: You also do a lot of communal projects with John’s fans. What has that been like?
MF: It has been wonderful. I cried when we see the results of every single one. I cried when people sent us messages of love to him, I cried when fans that met him told us the best stories ever. John’s so loved and to know that we are all gathered to send him love is one of the most special things I’m involved with.
AB: You are among a large number of women who are actively engaging, and leading, discussions in Beatledom today. In a fandom that has historically been dominated by men, how is this expansion of voices influencing John’s, and The Beatles’, legacy?
MF: It’s extremely clear how we, women, bring a new perspective and a new approach to the fandom and to the researches. Some men think that’s the wrong way to go, that we should stick to “what we know,” but that’s a very limited view. There’s so much more to explore, and in many ways that either people don’t allow themselves to dive in to or are afraid that that’s gonna create new levels that they don’t want to think about. As John used to say, most of the time the Beatles are treated as untouchables, as a myth that we should never break, but there are wonderful ways to expand beyond the myth, and do that respecting history, facts and feelings.
Actually, I think that that’s exactly what John would want us to do – forget about the myth, let’s get real, let’s talk about real stuff and put emphasis on what really matters. And I see us women doing that frequently in the Beatles fandom. I, for example, don’t see John as an idol, although I do refer to him with that word now and then when I lack another term. I think that itself influences my work with him, and the idolization of John by men interferes in the way they tell his story, interferes in the way John wanted to be seen, above this John Lennon image created over the years. And there are men who don’t idolize John but put themselves and others too far from him, and I think that’s another misconception. There’s a need for balance in order to understand who John was and share what’s closest to his truth. I believe women are contributing for that to change inside the fandom and in the way the Beatles’ legacy is perceived, we are bringing more balance.
I also don’t know any other woman from my country who studies John the way I do, and that’s a bit alarming, really. Di always studies a lot, but in a different way, I think. I’m more academic right now, I’m lecturing too as I told you. There was only one woman, besides me, who taught during the Beatles academic course here in Brazil, and even though she knows a lot, it was evident she was not a scholar, but rather a fan who knows a lot and likes to share her psychological perspective of them (she’s a therapist) and she talked about the Beatles, not John. I really don’t know any other academic woman dedicated to John here.
AB: That’s intriguing! I know a lot of women in Liverpool have started studying them academically. Plus, you have had some fabulous books written by women in recent past. Beyond that, I don’t see many women in Beatledom approaching Beatles academically. Many have excellent podcasts, yes, and they’re extremely well researched. But I’m not sure if that classifies as academia.
MF: That’s true! Sadly, I don’t think that classifies as academia, the podcasts. They have a big voice, thankfully. The ones I know better that are academic are Dr. Holly [Tessler] and Dr. Christine [Feldman-Barrett].
AB: Yes! Same.
MF: I truly don’t think there are more women here in Brazil dedicated to John, not only academically but in any level of research, approach or dedication. I really can only think of Di and I. Maybe men scared some of them away. Sadly the Beatles community here in Brazil can be very sexist. I’m lucky that the men around me are not sexist and value and respect what I share. But sadly some of the bigger Beatlemania names here are very egomaniacal and sexists. I can think about a lot of girls who are fans, wonderful fans really.
AB: John’s legacy, when contrasted with the other Beatles, seems to be the most contentious. Some think of him as the patron saint of peace. Others as the original counterculture guru. What do you think is John’s position in cultural consciousness today? & what is the role that his Estate and the fans are playing in its burnishing?
MF: Every single time I read something that John said and I never saw before, every single time I listen to an interview I didn’t remember about, I get shocked because John was always sharing something extremely coherent. And not that I don’t know how conscious and on point he was, but just because his points not only still make sense nowadays but also during different periods of our own lives.
He was right about society, he was right about governments, he was right about art, he was right about school and he was right about growth and evolution. He was right about how people saw him and how people would see him. He saw what most didn’t see back then and was coherent with what we know now. That obviously doesn’t mean that he was always right about those subjects, and he knew that, and we know that, but he was always right about not always being right, and that’s the magical thought behind all the other very correct points he made over the years. If people stopped and listened to John – again, beyond the Lennon image – they would see all of that and the ones that do see that, I can tell you, they are positively affected by John’s visions. On the other hand, I still think John’s greatest cultural impact is love.
Beyond any intellectual explanation. There’s this aura of love around him, anyone that gets involved with anything related to him, and allow themselves to see that, feel guided to understand more about the mysteries of life and soul, through that vibration of love. And that connects with what his team has been doing. I think the John Lennon Estate works in mainly three ways. They share what John believed, his own words, how he put his beliefs into his actions, emphasizing what he’d like to tell us and contextualizing it with today’s reality, but always careful not to disconnect John from his period and from his atemporal importance that certainly won’t ever be limited to the 2000s context. They also adapt John’s musical and activist legacy to today’s world, that’s what they have been doing with Mind Games. I see a huge respect coming from Sean, he knows what he can do and how to do it without stepping too far from John’s intentions and intuitions.
He brings new and refreshing interpretations to his father’s work – and mother’s as well, of course – and those make sense with the moment we are in. I think that even if he might sometimes not agree completely with some of his father’s views, he respects his father’s memory and time, comprehending that it might not be what he sees but that it does make sense to a lot of people still, as well. And I know, as a matter of fact, that the rest of the Estate’s team is always prioritizing what John would want or do. And the third way is, obviously, love. The love I’ve been receiving from them all these years changed me for the best. Their love gave me many new perspectives and also allowed me to grow, not only as a fan and researcher but as a human being as well. Both John and Yoko were right.
I really don’t know any other companies or Estates that do it this way and so effectively, so beautifully taking care of the fans. Just like John and Yoko, they know the power of love and I think that’s their main purpose. It feels like a hug. When we talk about the fans, I see us all emphasizing – sometimes through John’s words, sometimes from what we take from his words – our need for truth. We can’t speak for John, but we surely can speak on behalf of what we’ve been learning with him. And that’s a lot, especially when it comes to the new generations. If we relate to what John said many years ago, there’s something in there that the others should pay attention to, that’s the point we make. I see the John Lennon Estate and the fans united, love being our motivation, positive thinking being our way and peace always being our goal. We share the truth and we want peace, world and inner peace. And we do keep on playing those Mind Games together, forever!
This interview by Anushka Bidani is part of the series, The Fan Page Project.