{"id":21924,"date":"2015-05-09T11:10:22","date_gmt":"2015-05-09T14:10:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rioonwatch.org\/?p=21924"},"modified":"2015-08-15T13:08:43","modified_gmt":"2015-08-15T16:08:43","slug":"complexo-do-alemao-youth-create-documentary-to-promote-north-rios-urban-forest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/?p=21924","title":{"rendered":"Complexo do Alem\u00e3o Youth Create Documentary to Promote North Rio\u2019s Urban Forest"},"content":{"rendered":"

Between the smoke and the bullets of Rio\u2019s North Zone \/ The Serra<\/em> takes on its biggest challenge yet, becoming green \/<\/em> I love you, Serra da Miseric\u00f3rdia<\/em><\/p>\n

– Luiz Poeta, founder of Verdejar<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Complexo do Alem\u00e3o is home to the city’s\u00a0North Zone<\/a>‘s last remaining piece of\u00a0Atlantic Forest<\/a>, which stretches across Brazil\u2019s Atlantic coast. The Serra da Miseric\u00f3rdia, a 17 square-mile\u00a0piece of land, spreads through the 15 neighborhoods that make up Complexo do Alem\u00e3o<\/a>, home to approximately 200,000 people.<\/p>\n

A group of 17 young people from Complexo do Alem\u00e3o have joined the fight to preserve the Serra by producing a documentary entitled Olhares da Miseric\u00f3rdia<\/em> (Views of Miseric\u00f3rdia<\/em>). The short film mixes interviews with people who have a connection to the area, mostly long-term residents, with music, poetry and photos.<\/p>\n

Patricia Lima, part of the group, described the Serra as “like our lung. If we lost this land, we\u2019d suffocate in the polluted air of the city that is Rio de Janeiro,\u201d she joked.<\/p>\n

The documentary and accompanying photo booklet was created by the NGO Verdejar<\/a> (\u201cBecoming Green\u201d), founded 17 years ago by the late poet, activist and Complexo do Alem\u00e3o resident Luiz Poeta<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"Verdejar<\/a><\/p>\n

Verdejar campaigns for the protection of the Serra, which has seen consistent degradation caused by people and companies encroaching on the land, notably granite mining companies and the government energy company Light, <\/em>which was responsible for the removal of the NGO from its previous headquarters<\/a> in 2012.<\/p>\n

Verdejar<\/a>\u2019s activities include reforestation, community gardening and environmental education. Rafael Carvalho, one of Verdejar\u2019s collaborators, says that the documentary project was a chance to “make a link between culture and the environment.”<\/p>\n

The documentary is the result of Verdejar being awarded the status of Culture Point<\/a> by the federal\u00a0government in 2013.\u00a0Culture Points are a Brazil-wide federal government initiative launched in 2004 to recognize and support community-led groups that promote access to culture. The Brazilian government has committed to a target of 15,000 Culture Points by 2020<\/a>, each receiving an annual grant of about\u00a0US$20,000 (R$60,000).\u00a0There are currently about 4,000 such Culture Points throughout Brazil.<\/p>\n

Rafael explains that the group of young people \u201creceived training on the environmental history of the region and in audio-visual skills: how to film, how to edit\u2026 And from then on the idea was all theirs.\u201d<\/p>\n

The documentary was screened for the first time in three Complexo do Alem\u00e3o communities over a weekend in March. Verdejar\u2019s aim was to share the documentary with local residents in small public screenings before making it available online.<\/p>\n

\"Verdejar<\/a><\/p>\n

Many of the young people involved in the project attended\u00a0the first screening in Olaria. Alvaro Vin\u00edcius, one of the filmmakers, described the group\u2019s intention: \u201cWe\u2019re calling attention to the positive side of the Serra. We all know the problems, those who live here have lived alongside these problems for years.” With the documentary, \u201cwe\u2019re looking for solutions for this place. We don\u2019t want the Serra to continue towards the predicament\u00a0it\u2019s headed towards.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Olaria screening was followed by a debate on \u2018critical communication\u2019 in favelas, to which representatives from community media<\/a> groups had been invited, including Raizes em Movimento<\/a>, Copa Para Alem\u00e3o Ver<\/a>\u00a0and Coletivo Papo Reto<\/a>. Discussion was focused on the idea of communication as\u00a0a powerful tool for residents to demystify the image of Complexo do Alem\u00e3o, propagated by traditional media.<\/p>\n

\"Verdejar<\/a><\/p>\n

Patricia spoke up during the debate to stress the importance of communities making their voices heard, from sharing information on social media to creating original content: \u201cResidents can become communicators.”\u00a0She described her experience as part of the documentary team: \u201cI began with the photography course, then I got to know more about the history of the Serra, about the struggles that happened there\u2026I never imagined I\u2019d make a documentary about something so important.\u201d<\/p>\n

Those involved in the project hope the documentary will become a resource in Complexo do Alem\u00e3o and beyond. In Alvaro\u2019s words: \u201cI know the quality of this place; I have spent my whole life here. Now we\u2019re excited about spreading our passion to others\u2026 I want people in the future to know that it exists: the place where I grew up.\u201d<\/p>\n

Check out part of the documentary’s soundtrack below:<\/p>\n

[soundcloud url=”https:\/\/api.soundcloud.com\/tracks\/155275492″ params=”color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false” width=”100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” \/]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Between the smoke and the bullets of Rio\u2019s North Zone \/ The Serra takes on its biggest challenge yet, becoming green \/ I love you, Serra da Miseric\u00f3rdia – Luiz Poeta, founder of Verdejar Complexo […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":71,"featured_media":22006,"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":[1294,1290,1333,329,452,1329],"tags":[1606,32,504,385,602,188,37,1292,152,199,243,471,239,259],"writer":[1596],"translator":[],"illustrator":[],"photographer":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-21924","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-communitymedia","8":"category-civilsociety","9":"category-event-reports","10":"category-solutions","11":"category-rio20","12":"category-by-international-observers","13":"tag-coletivo-papo-reto","14":"tag-complexo-do-alemao","15":"tag-culture","16":"tag-environmental-education","17":"tag-film","18":"tag-history","19":"tag-north-zone","20":"tag-organizing","21":"tag-participation","22":"tag-reforestation","23":"tag-serra-da-misericordia","24":"tag-sustainability","25":"tag-verdejar","26":"tag-youth","27":"writer-sarah-jacobs"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21924","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\/71"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=21924"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21924\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/22006"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=21924"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=21924"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=21924"},{"taxonomy":"writer","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fwriter&post=21924"},{"taxonomy":"translator","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftranslator&post=21924"},{"taxonomy":"illustrator","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fillustrator&post=21924"},{"taxonomy":"photographer","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fphotographer&post=21924"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}