This film shot a huge circle of Waste Land in the suburbs around Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. In this is the largest Waste Land in the world, 7,000 tons of various wastes are dumped every day. Residents there search for available bottles and cans, plastics and metals and other materials as their business, and then sell them to recycling merchants to earn living expenses. Sebastiao, a garbage worker, has helped his family pick up and collect since he was 11 years old. He has been doing this for more than 20 years.
The artist Wick Muniz from New York made a special trip here, taking the scavengers there as the theme, hoping to find his own painting inspiration. Muniz selected Sebastiao, a garbage worker, as his model, and meticulously produced a painting of a scavenger resting in a discarded bath tub. The painting is based on real scavengers and Waste Land as the background. It is a subject that no one has ever tried. Two characters with the same roots but with different statuses understand and explore each other through their paintings, and they have shown great patience and enthusiasm in their work, which makes the film deeply moving. The film also records that after the painting was completed, the 32-year-old Sebastiao went to London with Muniz to participate in the auction of the painting in person. When he saw that the painting was sold at a high price of 45,000 US dollars, he was thrilled and burst into tears.
