{"id":35875,"date":"2017-04-08T17:09:50","date_gmt":"2017-04-08T20:09:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rioonwatch.org\/?p=35875"},"modified":"2017-04-12T14:22:16","modified_gmt":"2017-04-12T17:22:16","slug":"organizers-in-vidigal-seek-to-use-artistic-plaques-to-improve-urban-design-and-commemorate-community-history","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/?p=35875","title":{"rendered":"Faced with Gentrification, Vidigal Artists Design Plaques to Mark and Preserve Community Memory"},"content":{"rendered":"

Clique aqui para Portugu\u00eas<\/em><\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Although B\u00e1rbara Nascimento is a friend and co-organizer with Andr\u00e9 Gosi in Vidigal<\/a>, a South Zone favela which has experienced significant gentrification<\/a> in recent years<\/a>, \u201cno one has\u00a0the slightest idea\u201d about the name of the street where he lives. Nascimento, a teacher and current Master\u2019s student born and raised in Vidigal<\/a>, uses a set of well-known reference points throughout the favela to locate the homes of other fellow residents. Even when describing her own address to others, B\u00e1rbara \u201conly says that she lives in Pedrinha<\/em>\u201d (Little Rock).<\/p>\n

This system of urban mapping speaks to\u00a0the greater context of Rio de Janeiro, where favela culture is impacted\u00a0by tensions between community narratives and those pushed by the government<\/a>. In Vidigal, this friction extends to the politics of location, as city regulations and initiatives often contradict resident needs. The government once tried to give fruit-themed names to streets in Vidigal in the 1990s. As Nascimento explains, this proposed change was blind to the fact that many residents from Vidigal struggle to find jobs when their addresses are recognizable as belonging to a favela. \u201cThere was already this issue of prejudice<\/a>\u00a0towards\u00a0residents, and you want to name it Banana Street?\u201d Meanwhile, community-driven<\/a> attempts to name Vidigal\u2019s streets after living local heroes have been shot down by a government mandate that only allows deceased individuals to be commemorated.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Fast-forward to 2012, when German graphic designer Andr\u00e9 Koller experienced\u00a0the challenge of tracing the\u00a0informal community<\/a> while designing a local map called “Vidigal: 100 Secrets<\/a>.”\u00a0Seeking to more accurately place important landmarks on his map, Koller began to research the various reference points of Vidigal, finding \u201cthat there were rich stories<\/a>\u00a0behind the majority of these locations.\u201d Koller then reached out to Nascimento as a research partner, and eventually a new idea was born: to install strategic and artistic plaques at each of these important locations.<\/p>\n

From here, Koller and Nascimento contacted Gosi, who oversees culture at\u00a0the Vidigal Residents Association<\/a>, to join the project. 42 plaques have been selected, commemorating different areas in Vidigal, with two already designed. Eight local artists have confirmed their participation in the initiative, with five more expressing interest. Artists will have the freedom to choose the areas they want to commemorate, as well as the design of the plaques, and their work will be done on a volunteer basis. A crowdfunding campaign is directed towards purchasing materials to bring these plaques to life<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
One example of a plaque to be used, honoring an early resident\u00a0and well-known entrepreneur<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Nascimento, Gosi, and Koller say they have three goals: to preserve memory, to accomplish a project of upgrading\u00a0that the city of Rio is reluctant to undertake during a moment of crisis, and to pay homage to local heroes and figures of importance in an effort to give residents a sense of identity and build community pride<\/a>.\u00a0Plaques\u00a0will also serve as physical reference points to reinforce the collective knowledge and history surrounding each location.<\/p>\n

As such, an overarching aim of the project is to, as Nascimento put it, \u201clegitimize<\/a> the distinctive logic of the favela.\u201d Due to its decades of informality, Vidigal presents logistical challenges to an outsider that are nevertheless surmountable. \u201cWhen we buy something from a store and need it to be delivered here, we give them the street and the area. Businesses understand the reality of the neighborhood\u201d while the government refuses to. Unofficial streets in the favela, though they receive a CEP (zip code) designation, are not recognized by their community names by the authorities,\u00a0which makes receiving services extremely difficult. Through their campaign, Nascimento and Koller hope to achieve more mainstream recognition for Vidigal, as well as inspire other favela communities to take similar actions.<\/p>\n

\"B\u00e1rbara<\/a><\/p>\n

As a historical project, however, this initiative will serve a function specific to Vidigal. Collecting and making memories like these permanent is vitally important in a time when Vidigal is facing increasing gentrification<\/a> and the first generation of inhabitants is rapidly aging. As Koller puts it, \u201cA resident’s life is the story of Vidigal.\u201d Without documentation, in a few years, firsthand knowledge of the crucial years of the favela\u2019s formation will be lost.<\/p>\n

Please take a moment to support\u00a0Vidigal’s crowdfunding campaign\u00a0so they can purchase the materials to bring these plaques to life<\/a>.<\/em><\/h4>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Clique aqui para Portugu\u00eas Although B\u00e1rbara Nascimento is a friend and co-organizer with Andr\u00e9 Gosi in Vidigal, a South Zone favela which has experienced significant gentrification in recent years, \u201cno one has\u00a0the slightest idea\u201d about […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":142,"featured_media":35914,"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":[1267,1290,1268,1503,329,1329],"tags":[750,396,756,258,2394,674,65,170,188,254,618,558,270,156,363],"writer":[2385,2393],"translator":[],"illustrator":[],"photographer":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-35875","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-gentrificationwatch","8":"category-civilsociety","9":"category-favelaculture","10":"category-opportunities-to-support-favelas","11":"category-solutions","12":"category-by-international-observers","13":"tag-access","14":"tag-art","15":"tag-community-organizing","16":"tag-community-solution","17":"tag-crowdfunding","18":"tag-memory","19":"tag-gentrification","20":"tag-historic-preservation","21":"tag-history","22":"tag-mapping","23":"tag-neighborhood-association","24":"tag-prejudice","25":"tag-resistance","26":"tag-south-zone","27":"tag-vidigal","28":"writer-claire-jones","29":"writer-evan-fantozzi"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35875","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\/142"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=35875"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35875\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/35914"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=35875"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=35875"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=35875"},{"taxonomy":"writer","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fwriter&post=35875"},{"taxonomy":"translator","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftranslator&post=35875"},{"taxonomy":"illustrator","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fillustrator&post=35875"},{"taxonomy":"photographer","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fphotographer&post=35875"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}