{"id":19202,"date":"2014-11-14T22:18:37","date_gmt":"2014-11-15T01:18:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rioonwatch.org\/?p=19202"},"modified":"2014-11-14T22:34:40","modified_gmt":"2014-11-15T01:34:40","slug":"are-the-aesthetics-of-the-urban-periphery-core-to-contemporary-culture","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/?p=19202","title":{"rendered":"Are the Aesthetics of the Urban Periphery Core to Contemporary Culture?"},"content":{"rendered":"

A discussion<\/a> on the aesthetics of the urban periphery and their role in contemporary culture took place at Mar\u00e9 Art Center in Complexo da Mar\u00e9<\/a>, North Zone, on Saturday November 8.\u00a0Photography collective Imagens do Povo<\/a>, Fluminense Federal University (UFF)\u00a0anthropology professor Julio Tavares<\/a> and Heraldo HB from the Mate com Angu<\/a> film club in the Baixada Fluminense<\/a> participated in the debate, which was mediated and hosted by the Observat\u00f3rio de Favelas’ (Favelas Observatory)\u00a0Jorge Barbosa<\/a> as part of the Travessias 3 Art Festival<\/a>. The festival has been extended to\u00a0November\u00a022.<\/p>\n

\"Left<\/a>
Left to right: Heraldo HB, Julio Tavares, Francisco Valdean, Tha\u00eds Rocha, Rovena Rosa, Erika Tambke. Photo by Rosilene Miliotti of Imagens do Povo.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Revolutionizing the way we look at favelas<\/h3>\n

Founded by the Observat\u00f3rio de Favelas<\/a>, Imagens do Povo is a center of documentation, research, training and market insertion of photographers from low income regions. Their work exhibits, celebrates and looks critically at everyday life in Rio’s favelas and urban periphery.<\/p>\n

“People here keep revolutionizing the ways of thinking about the city and showing our own photographers\u2019 visions,\u201d said\u00a0Rovena Rosa,\u00a0current Imagens do Povo coordinator and former student.<\/p>\n

Created\u00a0in 2004, the Imagens do Povo program unites photography techniques with critical attitudes towards social issues in work which often looks to defend human rights and portray various local cultures.<\/p>\n

\u201cEach person has their own aesthetics and themes,\u201d explained Rosa. Imagens do Povo<\/a> trains photographers and currently has around 70 members in the photography collective. They also promote their art by participating in exhibitions in Rio de Janeiro and internationally, in London<\/a> and New Orleans<\/a>.<\/p>\n

“We show people’s day-to-day lives and\u00a0humanize this space,\u201d said Erika Tambke of Imagens do Povo.\u00a0\u201cThis already changes a lot of\u00a0the city’s aesthetics, and the city’s photography that is too focused on\u00a0the\u00a0South Zone and the Center…The very act\u00a0of taking pictures creates subjectivities and territories.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tha\u00eds Rocha, also a member, pointed out that their work also looks critically at government policies in the favelas: \u201cWe address social issues, like the Pacifying Police Units<\/a>,” she said.\u00a0\u201cThere\u2019s a strong social questioning.\u201d<\/p>\n

Some of their works can be seen\u00a0at\u00a0Travessias 3’s gallery, or at the weekly\u00a0Galeria 535<\/a>\u00a0exhibition at the Observat\u00f3rio de Favelas\u00a0in Mar\u00e9. The project\u00a0launched\u00a0its first book in 2012.<\/p>\n

\"Left<\/a>
Left to right: Julio Tavares, Francisco Valdean, Tha\u00eds Rocha, Jorge Barbosa, Rovena Rosa, Erika Tambke, Heraldo HB. Photo by Rosilene Miliotti\/Imagens do Povo<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Center vampirism or cannibalism of peripheries<\/h3>\n

Heraldo HB\u00a0is a cultural producer based in the Baixada Fluminense<\/a>. He has worked with open radio, university prep\u00a0courses, and Internet and communication projects. He has worked with film and cinema through the Mate Com Angu Cineclub project for the last eight years.<\/p>\n

Heraldo explained\u00a0how the Brazilian elite are ashamed of the poor and attempt to \u201cwhiten\u201d society and make\u00a0the\u00a0black, poorer population invisible<\/a>. On the other hand, he pointed out, some leftist politicians and thinkers regularly\u00a0idealize favela\u00a0residents\u00a0and Brazilians of African descent and impose their own limiting definitions. Heraldo celebrated the ways in which people are increasingly directly engaging and expressing themselves free from outside definition. \u201cWe are now showing our face, with as few intermediaries as possible,\u201d he concluded.<\/p>\n

Julio Tavares is a researcher and professor from Fluminense Federal University (UFF). His work is focused on the representation of black people in media, the African diaspora in South America, racism and discrimination, the body and ethnicity.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe cannibalistic attitude is only legitimized for the center, not the peripheries, which have to remain ‘authentic,’ frozen\u00a0in an intensely stylized form of popular culture,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Continuing the discussion of power structures, Tavares\u00a0gave examples of how the center has historically exploited the peripheries via domination and vampirism, such as the colonial relationships between European countries and regions in Asia, Africa and the Americas. In Rio de Janeiro, for example, the music genre bossa nova was born in the wealthy South Zone but borrowed heavily from renegade samba and American jazz.<\/p>\n

Tavares argued the necessity to fully decolonize the idea of folklore, usually considered to be of lower quality in respect to higher, erudite culture. This idea has disqualified and segregated some cultures, isolating them from communicating with others. Tavares suggested that globalization–a “mechanism of the center”–was a challenge to this organization of high and low culture.<\/p>\n

He speculated that all peripheries\u00a0\u201cwould, in time, globalize themselves as well\u00a0and intertwine, reaching worldwide scales.\u201d He gave\u00a0the example of the transregional and transnational de-colonization process of samba<\/a> and, in particular, capoeira<\/a> which was originally exported by its very agents, the capoeira masters. Maracat\u00fa<\/a>, jongo<\/a>, and other Afro-Brazilian cultural expressions have ceased to be considered folklore, although they still represent a tension with erudite culture for being ‘popular.’<\/p>\n

Despite this, Heraldo praised the role of Brazilian cultural resistance: \u201cIt’s so strong, even under this monopoly of communication, under this ideological massacre taking place in schools, under this hegemonic culture.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tavares celebrated the local history of favelas:\u00a0\u201cToday one can find the\u00a0origins and authors: by that\u00a0favela citizen, by that favela from that region. The innovation lies in the visibility and legitimacy of the production of aesthetic values in the last 20 or 30 years.\u201d He argued that peripheries have acquired personality and put their own stamp on this cultural production: \u201cIt\u2019s a self-consecration,\u201d he concluded.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
\nWhy do politics and economics matter for art?<\/h3>\n

The debate also touched on economics and politics. One audience member asked: \u201cHow can we empower collectivity<\/a>, those social interactions that are so fundamental to the creation of such aesthetics, and protect this potential from capital which, politically and economically, sterilizes everything<\/a>?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have to stop being naive about art. Cultural actions aren’t natural, they’re political,” said Tavares. “The only defense is political consciousness, otherwise we will rot\u00a0in the hands of the culture industry. The big trap is revenue and the income-driven idea of culture. Political issues instill identity consciousness… Political consciousness raises identity consciousness and vice-versa. It\u2019s crucial.”<\/p>\n

Another audience member asked about the informal economy and the vibrancy of favela markets and businesses: \u201cCould it be that this alternative way of doing business could be a solution for this cultural production? To export, sell, and reproduce these works?”<\/p>\n

Tavares\u00a0welcomed the intervention and said: \u201cMore than India, Brazil shows greater quantities of small producers, owners and sellers. It\u2019s the country of markets and street vendors, a country of marginal economy.\u201d The central economy, he argued, could learn from the small economic cycles and retune the philosophy to a \u201csmall vendor culture, ready to be flexible and in tune to the rhythm of market. [This is a] culture that could help get out of crisis.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A discussion on the aesthetics of the urban periphery and their role in contemporary culture took place at Mar\u00e9 Art Center in Complexo da Mar\u00e9, North Zone, on Saturday November 8.\u00a0Photography collective Imagens do Povo, […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":58,"featured_media":19204,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1333,1268,1329],"tags":[396,460,169,756,280,842,427,221,37,523,438,572,374,571,1462],"writer":[1398],"translator":[],"illustrator":[],"photographer":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-19202","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-event-reports","8":"category-favelaculture","9":"category-by-international-observers","10":"tag-art","11":"tag-baixada-fluminense","12":"tag-capoeira","13":"tag-community-organizing","14":"tag-complexo-da-mare","15":"tag-debate","16":"tag-economy","17":"tag-favela-culture","18":"tag-north-zone","19":"tag-observatorio-de-favelas","20":"tag-periphery","21":"tag-photography","22":"tag-politics","23":"tag-samba","24":"tag-travessias","25":"writer-andrea-cangialosi"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19202","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/58"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=19202"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19202\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/19204"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=19202"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=19202"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=19202"},{"taxonomy":"writer","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fwriter&post=19202"},{"taxonomy":"translator","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftranslator&post=19202"},{"taxonomy":"illustrator","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fillustrator&post=19202"},{"taxonomy":"photographer","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fphotographer&post=19202"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}