Di Cavalcanti was born in Rio de Janeiro when the city was undergoing trough a radical reubanization process leaded by the government, Rodrigues Alves, Brazil President, and managed by city mayor Pereira Passos. During his government, Passos chnged the provinvicial city aspect. He had built gorgeous squares, wide avenues, strongly impacting the way of life at the poor people, who used to live in the slum, pushing them to move to furlher neighborhood around the city. Based upon his personal view of such scenario, Di Cavalcanti created the Fantoches da Meia-noite series, breaking up with Art Nouveau style, followed by him until then. The work is made up of sixteen boards and a presentation folder by the writer Ribeiro Couto. The folder text regards to the impression that both kept on the cratures who in habited that neighborhood. The objective of this work is indentify the expressionist characteristics of the Fantoches da Meia-noite work, and verify a possible closeness with the chowings by the artist Egon Schiele. To accomplish so, we will atlain a formal analysis of Fantoches, following Donis A. Dondis methodology in his book Sintaxe da Linguagem Visual, and as theorical support, we will base on semiotical concepts theory.
