Arte e estética

This dissertation analyzes the works of contemporary artists from the Americas who produce representations of urban violence through multi-media chronicles. The chroniclers studied are the Chilean Pedro Lemebel, the Brazilians Paulo Lins, Fernando Meirelles and Kátia Lund, and the U.S. Latinos Joseph Rodríguez, Rubén Martínez, and Luis Rodríguez. The texts produced by these artists not only represent and explain contemporary geographies of violence but also become geographies of violence that audiences need to learn to inhabit and traverse. This dissertation addresses how the chronicle, in particular, articulates violence, identifies the advantages of using this genre to represent urban violence, considers how existing geographies of violence are distributed within the city and discusses how relevant the notion of space is to both their material development and manifestation and their symbolic presence through the chronicle.

The comparative textual analysis of the selected chronicles demonstrates how violence is understood and represented by contemporary artists with different backgrounds and exposes the differences and similarities of their representations. Reading these chroniclers comparatively enables the consideration of a variety of different media through which violence is expressed in order to determine how the choices made by the artists affect the reception of their works. Such analysis allows an in-depth study of what these artists do with the genre of the chronicle: first, how having chosen the chronicle affects their particular renditions of violence; second, how the chronicle as a genre is affected by the specific content of urban violence; and, ultimately, how the chronicle is redefined by specific aesthetic manipulations.

Finally, because each of the chroniclers selected for this study engages in translation practices, either as translators of their own work or as translators of other artists' work, this dissertation considers how their representations of urban violence are affected when they “travel” across a variety of media—that is, not only how the choice of media shapes these artists' representation of urban violence and their manipulation of the chronicle but also how their translation or transference from one medium to another impacts on their original representation of violence.

My dissertation examines how urban violence and its inscription in social imaginaries have shaped Latin American narrative production over the past fifty years. Specifically, I analyze three recent novels from Colombia and two from Brazil: Fernando Vallejo's La Virgen de los Sicarios (1994); Jorge Franco Ramos' Rosario Tijeras (1999); Mario Mendoza's Satanás (2002); Rubem Fonseca's Feliz Ano Novo (1975); and Patricia Melo's Inferno (2000). I describe two types of violence represented in these literary texts. The first type is a form of criminal violence associated (located) with specific urban social groups: marginal people from the lower class who become criminals and resort to crime (drug trafficking and organized crime). This representation of violence is portrayed in these novels as a spectacle. The second type of violence is depicted on a social and psychological but not criminal level that is closely related to the idea of omnipresent danger and ethical crisis. It is conceived not only as an anomaly of modern societies but also as a pathological phenomenon. Interdisciplinary in nature, my dissertation lies at the intersection of literary criticism and cultural studies.

The thesis examines the effects of the cross-fertilisation between cinematic, musical and televisual texts on depictions of two emblematic Brazilian social space - the favela (shantytown) and the sertão (arid backlands) - in recently released independent and mainstream domestic productions. I argue that through processes of intertextuality recent Brazilian films have gradually transformed the favela into a widely exposed, lucrative but also productively challenging spectacle. Similarly, the iconicity of the sertão has been resignified allowing a new understanding of the region to emerge. My analysis of recent films set in either the favela or the sertão also proposes that different elements, such as traditional and modern, local and non-local cultural forms, are not simply blended into a single hybrid filmic text. As these elements coexist and traverse the cinematic landscape in the contemporary moment, I insist on the fact that the idea of national culture, in Brazil as well as elsewhere, must be considered in relation to ever-changing contexts rather than in relation to prescriptive ideologies. My research contributes to reassessing Brazilian cinema history by exploring key examples of the aesthetic, constitutional and cultural interaction between popular media in the country. The reassessment allows me to challenge established distinctions between art and popular cinema, to propose more productive ways of understanding how different media can support their mutual development, and to highlight the implications of intertextuality for new expressions of brazilidade (Brazilianness). The discussion is based on an intertextual analysis of four recent domestic films: Cidade de Deus (City of God, 2002), Lisbela e o prisioneiro (Lisbela and the Prisoner, 2003), O invasor (The Trespasser, 2001) and Baile perfumado (Perfumed Ball, 1997). I examine elements of the mise-en-scène (mainly set design and performance), editing and soundtrack to identify cross-media references.

The writings of Carolina Maria de Jesus, specifically Quarto de despejo, Casa de alvenaria, Diario de Bitita, and poetry selections from her collection Minha antologia are oft times excluded from "canonical" literature. Many critics both in the press and in academic circles refuse to recognize her writings and story as works of merit, focusing primarily on surface issues without addressing the content of her works. The reason for this is complex, spanning the issues of race, education, socio-economic status, and gender. Contrary to the arguments of many critics over the past sixty years, Carolina's writings are valuable in a political, social, historical, and literary sense. She wrote of her fight against hunger, poverty, and prejudice, and spoke out against the practices of politicians and members of the middle and upper classes towards the poor. Her works contain experiences from a member of Brazil's marginalized population during the mid-twentieth century, something that had never before been published.

This paper aims to further interrogate the already precarious position of Brazil's favelas, or informal squatter communities. Due to Rio de Janeiro's role as the host of the 2016 Olympics and 2014 FIFA World Cup, the city government has been forced to rethink their attitudes towards favelas. This thesis claims that arts-based projects in the favelas exist in and through states of uncertainty, which is elucidated by the fact that the communities themselves exist in states of uncertainty due to police occupations and government sponsored upgrading programs that aim to make the favelas more palatable to the communities' international and local critics. While favelas are normally considered dystopias, I claim that they are critical utopias that both critique existing realities and offer alternatives and possibilities through which diverse people can comfortably co-exist. My discussion focuses on public projects that incorporate participation, community building, and placemaking in an attempt to legitimize auto-construction and defend against displacement. Throughout my discussion, I stress that the affective possibilities of socially engaged projects in the favelas emerge from processes of self-representation, and the issue of who is operating or initiating these projects falls second to the matter of who is speaking.

'Favela Effects: Brazilian Art at the Intersection of Community Development and Global Markets' investigates the representation of informal housing settlements, or favelas, of Rio de Janeiro, as a crucial facet of contemporary art. I investigate a complement of site-specific and socially-oriented practices based in the favelas in order to consider the shifting value of 'marginality' in the contemporary art world. I trace the global networks of donor agencies, arts biennials, NGOs, curators and art practices through which favela communities are incorporated into the cultural market. I also examine the manner in which artists and community activists re-route these networks to bolster local struggles for rights and resources.

Esta pesquisa é o mapeamento do break na cidade de São Paulo, uma dança que surgiu na década de 70 nos Estados Unidos a partir da tensão presente nas relações de raça e de classe e que faz com que os porto-riquenhos e negros criassem um estilo de dança no qual fosse possível trazer para o visível e o audível o que estava na ordem da sensação. Antes de ser uma dança, o break é a faixa instrumental do funk na qual são valorizadas as batidas e as linhas de baixo. A forma diferenciada pela qual, garotos e garotas dançavam nessa parte do funk. Eles e elas passaram a ser identificados como b.boys e b.girls, nome dado por DJ Kool Herc, um dos jamaicanos, que imigrou para os Estados Unidos na década de 60, e produzia as Block Partie, (festas de quarteirões), embaladas por soul, funk, jazz e músicas latinas no bairro do Bronx, em Nova York. Junto ao surgimento do break, cria-se um novo ritmo musical, proveniente da junção de samples de ritmos do hip-hop, do funk e do electro, o break beat. Essa música híbrida foi criada pelo próprio Kool Herc, e tem múltiplas variações. Essa modalidade de dança foi acoplada ao movimento hip-hop e nele ganhou forma. Nessa cartografia houve a necessidade de perscrutar minimamente os trajetos da configuração do protest song, movimento iniciado nos estados Unidos, mas que deixou seus rastros em várias diásporas negras, em especial no Brasil. Não é, no entanto, uma tentativa de retorno ao arcaico, e sim, de traçar linhas tênues do que chamei, provisoriamente, de ampliação da militância, a qual pode ser definida sugestivamente como fusão da música e da militância que cria uma potente malha-ardilosa na convocação dos corpos, da subjetividade e da vida, especialmente da população negra. No break a palavra é transformada em movimento de corpos com suas velocidades, gingas e saltos. Nisso tem-se forjado um território minimamente consistente de existência: são memórias corporais que estão se constituindo. Há três espaços públicos onde o break se manifesta: a roda (espaço de descontração), o racha (espaço de disputa) e o palco (espaço cênico). Não é somente a configuração do tipo de espaço físico que diferenciará a dança, mas, sobretudo a pré-disposição de corpos dos dançarinos. No break houve uma explosão das categorias de raça e de classe, pois um b.boy e uma b.girl, só são pela capacidade de dançar. Há uma diversidade de raças e de classes e não foi sentido conflitos entre elas. Essas categorias encontram-se, ainda, bem marcadas dentro do hip-hop, mas no que se refere à questão gênero, está, ainda travada e evidencia uma concepção de mulher marcada não por uma diferenciação, mas por desigualdade. No entanto, há um tremor anunciado por parte das b.girls para abalar o atual desenho das representações no break em São Paulo. É um devir-b.girl que se anuncia, um inconsciente que protesta, um corpo que grita e que se recusa a ceder mais uma vez. Começa-se a formar elos com outros corpos, num processo revolucionário que pretende alterar a cartografia dominante no break. Elas estão fazendo a vida break-ar na forja de outro croqui urbano.

This work focuses on the intersection of youth, their music and their agency, all of which interact to shape identities and create social change in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Music as media activism serves as backdrop, narrative, response, and counterpoint rhythm to the interlocking systemic violence(s) affecting favela youth. Identity issues around race, poverty and violence are the central focus as Brazil's homicide rates are some of the highest in the world with much of it concentrated in Rio and perpetrated by the state against youth of color. In 1993 rampant violence reached a climax as poor black and brown youth were being murdered daily in Rio's streets. The city's image of paradise on earth, and Brazil's self-narrative of racial democracy were suffering. Musical genres of funk and hip-hop proliferated in Rio's favelas facilitating life stories told by youth of color. Lyrics of racism, chronic poverty and violence surfaced in resistance to imposed constructions of blackness, space, and worth. In dialogue and resistance, youth design alternative worldviews and identities while performing grassroots participatory citizenship. In these ways young people disrupt structural violence and re-work local and global identities.

This ethnographic study of the conflicting social lives of representations of the city centers around the creators of a 4,000-square-foot three-dimensional mockup of Rio constructed with painted bricks, mortar, and detritus. For over fifteen years, teenage boys have enacted a role-playing game within this miniature urban world known as Morrinho, or "Little Hill," on the forested edge of their hillside squatter settlement, or favela. By manipulating and ventriloquizing thousands of inch-tall figurines representing residents, drug lords, police, DJs, politicians, prostitutes—a panoply of social figures—they produce a subversive and ludic perspective on urban reality. The game occupies the same physical ground as competing models: since Morrinho's inception, Rio's elite military police battalion have used the community that gave rise to Morrinho as a "live" training ground, and the municipal urban development agencies have implemented a patchwork of engineering projects and social programs aimed at incorporating this favela into formal property markets. These state initiatives hinge on rendering space and people legible to modes of rule through the use of maps, statistics, and tactical knowledge. Amid these changes in infrastructure and security, Morrinho has become valorized as an alternative form of knowing the city. Its creators have traveled internationally as artists, building replicas of their model in collaboration with youth in new urban contexts. Participants define Morrinho as a space of autonomous reflection on the city, and the mimetic relationship of their form of play to systems of power and the production of space does not reproduce these processes as a copy, but rather stages it on its own terms. This dissertation thus argues that maps, models, and narratives do not simply describe an external reality but actively participate in remaking the spaces of the city.

Favelas are Brazilian informal housing settlements that are areas of concentrated poverty. In Rio de Janeiro, favelas are perceived as areas of heightened criminal activity and violence, and residents experience discrimination, and little access to quality education and employment opportunities. In this context, hundreds of non-formal educational arts and leisure programs work to build the self-esteem and identity of youth in Rio's favelas as a way of preventing the youth from negative local influences.

The Morrinho organization, located in the Pereira da Silva favela in Rio, uses art as a way for the local male youth to communicate their lived reality. This study used a visual critical ethnographic methodology to describe the way in which the Morrinho participants interpret living in a favela. Seventeen semi-structured interviews with young men aged 15 to 29, the feature-length documentary film on the organization, 206 researcher produced documentary style photographs of the Morrinho artwork, and the researcher's field notes were analyzed. Truth claims, ways of seeing as communicated through words and actions, were induced through a cyclical process of reconstructive horizon analysis that incorporated the societal context and critical theory.

The participants communicated their concerns about life in a favela; however, they did not describe their societal positions in terms of complete marginalization. They named multiple benefits of living in Pereira da Silva, discussed positive and negative experiences in school, and described ways they circumvented discrimination. Morrinho as an organization was described as an enthralling game and a social project that benefited dozens of local youth. Character development was a valuable result of participation at Morrinho. The Morrinho artwork communicates a nuanced vision of both benevolent and violent social actors, and counters the overwhelmingly negative dominant characterization of Rio de Janeiro's favelas.

This study has implications for an inclusive critical pedagogy and the use of art as a means to facilitate a transformative education. Further research is recommended to explore terminology used to refer to favelas, and perceptions that favela residents have of their experiences in public education.