José Medeiros (Teresina, Piauí, 1921 - L'Aquila, Italy, 1990) began photographing around 1937 as an amateur in his hometown. In 1946, the French photographer Jean Manzon invited him to join the team of the magazine O Cruzeiro, where he stayed until 1962. In 1957, he published the book "Candomblé," the first to document the Afro-Brazilian religion. With Flávio Damm, he maintained the photography agency Imagem from 1962 to 1965. He then worked as a director of photography in cinema, in addition to directing short films and the feature "Parceiros da Aventura" in 1979. He was the director of photography for classic works of national cinema such as "A Falecida" (1965) by Leon Hirszman (1937 - 1987), "Xica da Silva" (1976) by Cacá Diegues (1940), and "Memórias do Cárcere" (1983) by Nelson Pereira dos Santos (1928). In the late 1980s, he taught photography at the International School of Cinema in San Antonio de Los Baños, Havana, Cuba.