PIXAÇÃO and the politics of expression in São Paulo
On the 31st of June, 2014, the São Paulo military police murdered two men on the top of a high rise located in the east side of the city. Alex Della Vecchia Costa (also known as ALD) and Ailton de Santos (also known as Anormal) entered the residential building that night with the intent of leaving their trace on the building’s exterior in the form of pixação—a distinctive style of spray painting native to São Paulo. The building’s caretaker saw Alex and Ailton on the top floor of the building and called the police, who then shot the two pixadores—as practitioners of pixação are called—upon their arrival. Authorities later maintained that the two men were armed burglars, but provided no proof of these claims.
A year after the deaths of Alex and Ailton, a group of pixadores gathered in the center of the city to protest their unjust murder. They carried images of the deceased’s faces along with banners marked with the distinctively angular and cryptic lettering characteristic of pixação. Passersby were wary of the crowd.
Protestor and prolific pixador Djan Ivson—who also goes by the name Cripta—took the opportunity to reflect on the status of pixação when interviewed by a local television station. “Society in general is very individualist,” he said. “They don't care about anything. But the pixador is defending the collective interests of those from the periphery, of those from a social class that's ignored by the state.” And indeed, this moment of solidarity among pixadores stood as a kind of physical manifestation of this attempt at defending collective interests even amidst environments of blatant ignorance, racism, and hate.
“It’s a peaceful protest,” Djan responded when asked what he thinks “victims” of pixação would say about the act of marking someone’s property. “The walls aren’t alive.”
A year after the deaths of Alex and Ailton, a group of pixadores gathered in the center of the city to protest their unjust murder. They carried images of the deceased’s faces along with banners marked with the distinctively angular and cryptic lettering characteristic of pixação. Passersby were wary of the crowd.
Protestor and prolific pixador Djan Ivson—who also goes by the name Cripta—took the opportunity to reflect on the status of pixação when interviewed by a local television station. “Society in general is very individualist,” he said. “They don't care about anything. But the pixador is defending the collective interests of those from the periphery, of those from a social class that's ignored by the state.” And indeed, this moment of solidarity among pixadores stood as a kind of physical manifestation of this attempt at defending collective interests even amidst environments of blatant ignorance, racism, and hate.
“It’s a peaceful protest,” Djan responded when asked what he thinks “victims” of pixação would say about the act of marking someone’s property. “The walls aren’t alive.”
HISTORY AND CONTEXT
Pixação—translated literally as “writing in tar”—has its roots in the Brazilian military dictatorship, which lasted from 1964 until 1985. This period of authoritarian rule was characterized by extreme measures of censorship that prohibited citizens from criticizing the government or expressing themselves in any manner deemed illegitimate. Amidst this environment of radically truncated free speech, citizens of São Paulo began to take to the walls in order to express their discontents. “Abaixo a ditadura” (Down with the dictatorship) began appearing on surfaces throughout the city. These firsts instance of pixação were not driven by any kind of aesthetic agenda, but rather took as their primary motivation a criticism of the Brazilian political system. Unlike pixação today, these writings sought to be readable to the largest number of people possible. And while contemporary pixação may seem only a distant relative of these first manifestations of rage, it is crucial to remember the strong political context out of which the form was birthed.
First instances of pixação in the center of São Paulo during the Military Dictatorship. "Abaixo a ditadura" (Down with the dictatorship)
Rita de Cássia Aleves Oliveira, professor of social science at the Potifícia Universidade Católita in São Paulo, also makes a connections between the rise of pixação in the 80’s and the decline of the public school system at the very same time. While it is impossible to draw a direct line of causation between these two phenomena, the correlation is nonetheless revealing. And public schooling is only one small part of a larger set of economic issues that disproportionately affected those living on the peripheries of the city. It is here perhaps important to note the fact that practitioners of pixação come almost entirely from the peripheries of São Paulo, a group that has historically been marginalized and ignored throughout the development of the city. The distinctions between those who live in the center of the city and those who live in the peripheries fall almost entirely on economic and racial lines.
Moreover, it is absolutely crucial to situate the history of pixação within the larger urban and social shifts that were happening in São Paulo at the end of the 20th century. Teresa Caldeira (2015) reflects on this process of “peripheral urbanization” in which residents who were unwelcomed in the existing fabric of the city found themselves the agents of urbanization outside of São Paulo’s formal limits. These peripheral communities began appearing at the edges of São Paulo around the 1940s. According to Caldeira, this process of urbanization, which is common to a number of urban centers in the global south, has three characteristics. First, it operates within long-term temporal frame in which spaces are constantly in the making. Second, it unsettles official logics (e.g. of formal labor, legal property, market capitalism). Third, and perhaps most importantly, it “creates new modes of politics through practices that produce new kinds of citizens, claims, circuits, and contestations.”
Moreover, it is absolutely crucial to situate the history of pixação within the larger urban and social shifts that were happening in São Paulo at the end of the 20th century. Teresa Caldeira (2015) reflects on this process of “peripheral urbanization” in which residents who were unwelcomed in the existing fabric of the city found themselves the agents of urbanization outside of São Paulo’s formal limits. These peripheral communities began appearing at the edges of São Paulo around the 1940s. According to Caldeira, this process of urbanization, which is common to a number of urban centers in the global south, has three characteristics. First, it operates within long-term temporal frame in which spaces are constantly in the making. Second, it unsettles official logics (e.g. of formal labor, legal property, market capitalism). Third, and perhaps most importantly, it “creates new modes of politics through practices that produce new kinds of citizens, claims, circuits, and contestations.”
The edge of Paraisópolis, one of the largest favelas on the periphery of São Paulo
We must therefore be attentive to the context out of which pixação came in order to recognize the ways in which it responds to the uneven urbanization of the city and acts as a spatial manifestation of rage generated by long histories of dominance and discrimination. Importantly, pixação--as well as other kinds of cultural production coming from São Paulo’s peripheries—represents a kind of departure from previous generations’ contestations that sought recognition for workers’ rights and access to the quality of life that was available for those living in the center of the city. Thinking of these demands spatially, they represent a desire to bring the center of the city to the peripheries. Pixação, however, offers a model that is nearly the opposite: it brings the peripheries to the center. Caldeira: “More than improper appropriations of public or private space, they [pixadores] imprint on the city, especially on its wealthier parts, the presence of those who were supposed to be invisible.” Pixação thus acts as a kind of de-centering force. It refuses to let its peripheries remain unseen.
STYLE
It is perhaps important here to clear up some issues of vocabulary. While in the United States the term “graffiti” connotes a style that includes such varied forms as tagging and bombing, in the Brazilian context the word “graffiti” signals a very specific style of writing that makes use of color and figuration. Indeed, while people from other cities would likely point to pixação as merely a type of graffiti, Paulistas—as residents of São Paulo are called—are adamant about distinguishing between the two. And this categorization often holds assumptions about the supposed inferiority of pixação as well as the kinds of people who are making it.
pixação graffiti
Unlike graffiti, pixação is usually written in black and doesn’t use figuration but rather rectilinear forms and sharp angles. This distinctive aesthetic, which was birthed in São Paulo, opens up a conversation about Brazil’s long and complex history of reimagining foreign modes of cultural expression. It is largely agreed that pixação’s cryptic angularity comes from punk rock and heavy metal album covers that made their way to Brazil from the United States in the 80s. Bands like Iron Maiden, Black Sabbath, and Slayer used typography on their album covers that was inspired by ancient Anglo-Saxon scripts. These runic scripts were then taken up by pixadores from the peripheries of São Paulo who were inspired by this manipulation of language and continued to push it to even greater extremes.
This instance of creative appropriation stands in a long lineage of other such instances and echoes the call for “cultural cannibalism” that 20th Century Brazilian poet Oswald de Andrade lays out in his Manifesto Antropófago. Again, it is important that we conceptualize these acts not as mere copying but rather as an example of a kind of creative appropriation that reveals the capacity of pixadores to interact with elements of globalized culture while simultaneously asserting their own sense of place.
It is also important to recognize that many pixadores would be thoroughly uncomfortable with the idea of their creations being placed in a lineage with other socially accepted forms of creative expression. “Pixação transcends the lineage of art history,” says one pixador interviewed in João Wainer’s 2009 documentary Pixo. “It’s an art that exists on the edge.”
This instance of creative appropriation stands in a long lineage of other such instances and echoes the call for “cultural cannibalism” that 20th Century Brazilian poet Oswald de Andrade lays out in his Manifesto Antropófago. Again, it is important that we conceptualize these acts not as mere copying but rather as an example of a kind of creative appropriation that reveals the capacity of pixadores to interact with elements of globalized culture while simultaneously asserting their own sense of place.
It is also important to recognize that many pixadores would be thoroughly uncomfortable with the idea of their creations being placed in a lineage with other socially accepted forms of creative expression. “Pixação transcends the lineage of art history,” says one pixador interviewed in João Wainer’s 2009 documentary Pixo. “It’s an art that exists on the edge.”
Much of what has been written about pixação, however, tends to treat it as a kind of homogenous and static entity. While there is certainly a clear aesthetic base upon which all pixação draws, it is incredibly important that we not make broad generalizations about the style as a whole. These generalizations obscure the multi-faced and constantly-shifting elements that make up pixação, leaving no space for the potential of change. Perhaps, then, more work is needed in deciphering different sub-categories of pixação as a means of revealing its true complexities. Yet perhaps this kind of categorization would be destructive in the way in which it would attempt to place pixação firmly in the realm of understanding, thus allowing outsiders to believe that they have a kind of purchase over the form. Perhaps some things are better left unknown.
INDECIPHERABLE
Pixação is notorious for its indecipherability amongst crowds who are not versed in its distinctive typographic forms. Its inability to be read by the majority of the population echoes discourses around graffiti in the United States and exposes the anxieties of those who are unable to make sense of the messages that appear throughout the city.
McAuliffe and Iveson (2011: p.134-5) reflect on these dynamics: “this notion that graffiti is a form of ‘private address’ is highly problematic. It relies on a liberal idealization of a mythical ‘general public’ that is apparently universally upset by graffiti due to its illegibility and its placement […] such framings of the ‘general public’ are ideological maneuvers which serve to mask the many ways in which claims to universality work to privilege particular interests over others.” Thus, we could extend this problematic logic of “private address” to critique the apparent universality of something like corporate advertising, for example. Where does it leave those who are unable to read the signs as a result of the failure of public education? Aren’t all forms of address essentially private?
It is thus important that we scrutinize the ways in which pixação is constantly described as “cryptic.” We must ask: cryptic for whom?
McAuliffe and Iveson (2011: p.134-5) reflect on these dynamics: “this notion that graffiti is a form of ‘private address’ is highly problematic. It relies on a liberal idealization of a mythical ‘general public’ that is apparently universally upset by graffiti due to its illegibility and its placement […] such framings of the ‘general public’ are ideological maneuvers which serve to mask the many ways in which claims to universality work to privilege particular interests over others.” Thus, we could extend this problematic logic of “private address” to critique the apparent universality of something like corporate advertising, for example. Where does it leave those who are unable to read the signs as a result of the failure of public education? Aren’t all forms of address essentially private?
It is thus important that we scrutinize the ways in which pixação is constantly described as “cryptic.” We must ask: cryptic for whom?
"I can only read pixação. These letters here I don't understand." Screenshot from Pixo, 2009.
SPATIAL LOGICS
Tim Cresswell (1996: p. 42) figures (American) graffiti as a manifestation of unruliness. Cresswell: “Graffiti flagrantly disturbs notion of order. It represents a disregard for order and, it seems to those who see it, a love of disorder—of anarchy and of things out of place.” Much of this same rhetoric of unruliness and disorder has been extended to the discussions of pixação in São Paulo, where it is figured by the mainstream as a kind of visual pollution that is utterly without logic. Many pixadores would agree with this claim.
Screenshot from Pixo, 2009
Yet this conception of pixação as a purely anarchic and disorderly phenomenon is perhaps a dangerous one given its potential to completely obscure the kinds of logics that are at play within pixação as well as the very agency of the pixador. What kinds of order might exist beneath the seemingly unruly façade of pixação?
Jeff Ferrel and Robert D. Weide (2010: p. 50) work to dismantle a conception of American graffiti as a “random act of criminal disorder, unpredictability and inexplicability manifesting in the urban environment.” Through their situated spatial analysis of graffiti, they expose the multiple ways in which graffiti’s placement is governed by careful considerations of moral codes, audiences and visibility, and longevity. These categories undo a conceptualization of graffiti as a purely “disorderly” phenomenon and instead reveal the amount of thought that often goes behind its placement. And this analysis must be extended to our understanding of pixação.
Moreover, this “spot” selection is also crucial in the formation of identity and status for pixdores who seek to become a part of this spatially-conscious subculture. Pixadores who are able to leave their trace on the highest buildings in the city, for example, are the ones who gain the most respect from their peers. Again, these spatial logics challenge a notion of pixação as an act of purely irrational rage.
Jeff Ferrel and Robert D. Weide (2010: p. 50) work to dismantle a conception of American graffiti as a “random act of criminal disorder, unpredictability and inexplicability manifesting in the urban environment.” Through their situated spatial analysis of graffiti, they expose the multiple ways in which graffiti’s placement is governed by careful considerations of moral codes, audiences and visibility, and longevity. These categories undo a conceptualization of graffiti as a purely “disorderly” phenomenon and instead reveal the amount of thought that often goes behind its placement. And this analysis must be extended to our understanding of pixação.
Moreover, this “spot” selection is also crucial in the formation of identity and status for pixdores who seek to become a part of this spatially-conscious subculture. Pixadores who are able to leave their trace on the highest buildings in the city, for example, are the ones who gain the most respect from their peers. Again, these spatial logics challenge a notion of pixação as an act of purely irrational rage.
The logics at play within pixação thus reveal themselves to be highly calculated. While there is no official map that details the locations of pixação (such a map would be nearly impossible given its extremely ephemeral nature), any visitor to São Paulo can tell you that the majority of pixação can be found towards the center of the city. Again, this is a deliberate choice on the part of the pixador that ultimately has the effect of de-centering the city in the way that it brings previously unheard voices into spaces inhabited by the economic, political, and social elite. By marking the center of the city, pixadores directly respond to the building boom and “urban renewal” projects that took place towards the end of the 20th century and displaced huge numbers of citizens to the peripheries of the city.
Above: Christ the Redeemer Statue in Rio de Janeiro after being covered in pixação; Newspaper article "Paulistas go to Rio to cover Christ the Redeemer in Pixação"; Copan building, designed by Oscar Neimeyer; Ramos de Azevedo Fountain in downtown São Paulo; The Church of São Francisco de Assis marked with pixação
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Pixadores have often made a point of marking buildings or landmarks that hold a significant kind of weight within the Brazilian imaginary. Buildings designed by Oscar Neimeyer, Brazil’s most acclaimed architect, are perhaps the biggest prize for any pixador in São Paulo. In 1990, two pixadores from São Paulo even traveled to Rio de Janeiro to cover the Christ the Redeemer Statue—undoubtedly Brazil’s most famous landmark—with pixação. These instances again reveal the kinds of logics that are at play within the placement of pixação, challenging a notion that it is a completely disorderly and anarchic mode of expression. A reading of pixação as a purely unruly phenomenon may, in fact, prove to be highly problematic in the way in which it denies its creators the capacity to act rationally. This figure of the irrational pixador works hand in hand with rendering them as the inhuman other and thus allowing for violence to be enacted against them.
Yet it would be equally problematic to say that all pixadores are always calculating and rational about their acts of expression. Many pixadores have no idea why they are doing what they are doing. “I don’t know. I have to do it,” says one of the pixadores interviewed by João Wainer. This, of course, doesn't make their actions any less political. |
Understanding pixação is thus not a question of labeling it as orderly or chaotic, as rational or irrational. Instead, any truly rigorous analysis of the form should ultimately expose the ways in which it renders these binaries completely irrelevant.
Furthermore, Lefebvre (1993) reflects on the ways in which seemingly anarchic relations within space have the potential to create another kind of order—an order that arises from a non-hierarchical and unplanned production of space. For Lefebvre, these seemingly unordered spaces are "places of the possible." More than distinguishing between pixação as orderly or (and) disorderly, this reading prompts a reflection on what constitutes “order” in the first place. Order is, of course, an ideological construction that works to valorize certain modes of occupying space as more valid than others. We must recognize, then, the ways in which any attempt to label pixação as orderly or (and) disorderly play into this arbitrary construction of occupying space that has historically worked to marginalize and criminalize those who do not conform to the norms drawn out by this system. Pixação asserts its own order.
Furthermore, Lefebvre (1993) reflects on the ways in which seemingly anarchic relations within space have the potential to create another kind of order—an order that arises from a non-hierarchical and unplanned production of space. For Lefebvre, these seemingly unordered spaces are "places of the possible." More than distinguishing between pixação as orderly or (and) disorderly, this reading prompts a reflection on what constitutes “order” in the first place. Order is, of course, an ideological construction that works to valorize certain modes of occupying space as more valid than others. We must recognize, then, the ways in which any attempt to label pixação as orderly or (and) disorderly play into this arbitrary construction of occupying space that has historically worked to marginalize and criminalize those who do not conform to the norms drawn out by this system. Pixação asserts its own order.
ART, CRIME, pixação
Like American graffiti, pixação has a precarious relationship with the term “art.” While some pixadores insist on calling their creations art, others cringe at any implication of the term. Some pixadores are waiting for the day that they will final be recognized as artists while others relish in the barbaric image that society has painted of them.
Much of the discourse around whether or not pixação is art is unsurprisingly based around a discussion of whether or not it is beautiful. These discussions of beauty are, of course, based entirely on subjective criteria that arbitrarily position some forms of aesthetic expression more entitled to exist than others.
Much of the discourse around whether or not pixação is art is unsurprisingly based around a discussion of whether or not it is beautiful. These discussions of beauty are, of course, based entirely on subjective criteria that arbitrarily position some forms of aesthetic expression more entitled to exist than others.
Yet we would be amiss to abandon the category of beauty entirely. For many pixadores, their pixação is beautiful. For others, it is intentionally ugly—a way of forcing recognition from those who continue to ignore voices from the periphery. This anger is reflected in the language that many pixadores use when talking about their craft. Echoing the American term “bombing,” pixadores will often use terms like “arrebentar,” “detonar,” or “escancarar” (“smash,” “blow-up,” or “destroy”) to describe their process. For some pixadores, it is better to be hated than ignored.
These feelings have revealed themselves in the numerous interventions pixadores have made in spaces designated for fine art. In 2008, for example, a group of pixadores wrote on the walls of the Museum of Modern Arts during its biennial exhibition. Similar interventions have been made on exhibitions at the São Paulo School of Fine Arts as well as in galleries that have recently begun to exhibit works graffiti and pixação like Choque Cultural. It is clear, therefore, that there are a number of pixadores who attempt to cultivate an antagonistic—sometimes violent—relationship towards mainstream conceptions of art.
Rather than attempting to classify pixação as either art or not art, however, what is needed is the kind of interrogation of this common dialectical position that is taken by McAuliffe and Iveson (2011: p. 130), in which there is a recognition that “both positions are (partly) right. The ‘or’ in this question implies that ‘art’ and ‘crime’ are mutually exclusive categories – graffiti can only be one or the other. We want to suggest that it might be both.” Indeed, this complex space in between art and crime proves to be an extremely productive one. Therefore, Much like the way pixação undoes the binary between order and chaos, so too does it call into question the boundaries between art and crime. As Bloch (2016: p.446) points out, “Such binary reductionism justifies the hatred of some graffiti [read: pixação] which, by extension, is used as justification for the hatred of “some types” of graffiti writers based on age, class, level of educational attainment, race, and ethnicity.” Again, it is important to recognize the kinds of work that such binaries as art vs. crime do in promoting certain modes of expression as more legitimate and consequently augmenting levels of hatred and violence towards those who do not subscribe to such expressive norms.
These feelings have revealed themselves in the numerous interventions pixadores have made in spaces designated for fine art. In 2008, for example, a group of pixadores wrote on the walls of the Museum of Modern Arts during its biennial exhibition. Similar interventions have been made on exhibitions at the São Paulo School of Fine Arts as well as in galleries that have recently begun to exhibit works graffiti and pixação like Choque Cultural. It is clear, therefore, that there are a number of pixadores who attempt to cultivate an antagonistic—sometimes violent—relationship towards mainstream conceptions of art.
Rather than attempting to classify pixação as either art or not art, however, what is needed is the kind of interrogation of this common dialectical position that is taken by McAuliffe and Iveson (2011: p. 130), in which there is a recognition that “both positions are (partly) right. The ‘or’ in this question implies that ‘art’ and ‘crime’ are mutually exclusive categories – graffiti can only be one or the other. We want to suggest that it might be both.” Indeed, this complex space in between art and crime proves to be an extremely productive one. Therefore, Much like the way pixação undoes the binary between order and chaos, so too does it call into question the boundaries between art and crime. As Bloch (2016: p.446) points out, “Such binary reductionism justifies the hatred of some graffiti [read: pixação] which, by extension, is used as justification for the hatred of “some types” of graffiti writers based on age, class, level of educational attainment, race, and ethnicity.” Again, it is important to recognize the kinds of work that such binaries as art vs. crime do in promoting certain modes of expression as more legitimate and consequently augmenting levels of hatred and violence towards those who do not subscribe to such expressive norms.
GRAFFITI vs. pixação
"Art? no. Graffiti is art. this here is just vandalism."
São Paulo has recently gained huge amounts of international attention from its graffiti, which continues to draw tourists to the city. Os Gêmeos, a graffiti duo from the city, have drawn particular acclaim in recent years and have exhibited their work around the world on the streets as well as in galleries. Politicians and citizens alike are beginning to celebrate graffiti as a point of local pride. And the city is responding to this shift by sanctioning more spaces for graffiti to be painted. Spaces like the beco do batman (batman’s cave) in the city’s hip Vila Madalena neighborhood are particularly suggestive of this shift. There are even a number of galleries that have emerged throughout the city that are entirely devoted to the exhibition of graffiti and other forms of street art.
Yet—as the earlier discussion of the art vs. crime binary suggests—it is absolutely crucial to interrogate these celebrations of graffiti and recognize the ways in which they reinforce private property relations as well as social class divisions. Moreover, this shift towards graffiti is likely having an overwhelmingly negative effect on the ways that pixadores are viewed by the rest of the city and consequently how they are treated by law enforcement.
Yet—as the earlier discussion of the art vs. crime binary suggests—it is absolutely crucial to interrogate these celebrations of graffiti and recognize the ways in which they reinforce private property relations as well as social class divisions. Moreover, this shift towards graffiti is likely having an overwhelmingly negative effect on the ways that pixadores are viewed by the rest of the city and consequently how they are treated by law enforcement.
The Open Museum of Urban Art, a sanctioned space for graffiti beneath a freeway in São Paulo
Considering the shift away from the anti-capitalist origins of the American graffiti, Iveson (2007: p.135) notes how “legal graffiti projects reinscribe a respect for private property relations, and the consequent control by owners over the appearance of public space in which they are located.” This line of thinking can also be extended to the kinds of celebrations of graffiti that are happening in São Paulo, in which an increase in the amount of spaces for sanctioned graffiti are simultaneously upholding the private property relations that the act of painting on walls originally critiqued.
Pixação, on the other hand, maintains its antagonistic position towards the private property relation, calling into question the commodification of space and, to put it in Marxian terms, challenging authority’s conception of a space’s singular exchange-value by exposing its various use-values. The concept of legal or accepted pixação is thus something of a contradiction. “Pixação accepts the illicit as something both inevitable and desirable, as the only location from where young men from the peripheries can speak,” writes Caldeira. It therefore comes as no surprise that any attempts to control or commodity pixação—as well as attempts to liken it to graffiti—are often met with outrage from within the pixação community. Indeed, pixação is more and more beginning to become coopted into contemporary market logics that attempt to contain it and sell it as a commodity. You can now, for example, purchase a pixação font on your computer for a mere US$25. In 2012 the 7th Berlin Bienniale for Contemporary Art even invited a group of pixadores to make an “artistic intervention.” While pixação’s place within a globalized world of art and commodities has begun to shift, its deep roots in a community that seeks to rage against the very capitalist configurations that form the base of the marginalization of those from the periphery of São Paulo are no less potent.
Pixação, on the other hand, maintains its antagonistic position towards the private property relation, calling into question the commodification of space and, to put it in Marxian terms, challenging authority’s conception of a space’s singular exchange-value by exposing its various use-values. The concept of legal or accepted pixação is thus something of a contradiction. “Pixação accepts the illicit as something both inevitable and desirable, as the only location from where young men from the peripheries can speak,” writes Caldeira. It therefore comes as no surprise that any attempts to control or commodity pixação—as well as attempts to liken it to graffiti—are often met with outrage from within the pixação community. Indeed, pixação is more and more beginning to become coopted into contemporary market logics that attempt to contain it and sell it as a commodity. You can now, for example, purchase a pixação font on your computer for a mere US$25. In 2012 the 7th Berlin Bienniale for Contemporary Art even invited a group of pixadores to make an “artistic intervention.” While pixação’s place within a globalized world of art and commodities has begun to shift, its deep roots in a community that seeks to rage against the very capitalist configurations that form the base of the marginalization of those from the periphery of São Paulo are no less potent.
These attempts at commodification must be considered in tandem with the negative consequences of the relationship that is being drawn out between pixação and graffiti. Bloch (2016: p.445) posits that, “By advocating for legal walls and sanctioned spaces, supporters are contributing to the confinement of graffiti, thereby reducing it to an aesthetic product rather than a productive aspect of public urbanism.” In addition to this, in the context of São Paulo these endorsements of graffiti render pixação as an even more marginalized form of expression. With the opportunity to paint on spaces that are deemed acceptable by society at large, pixadores become vilified by those who do not understand their motivations for not conforming to this model for expression. Graffiti and pixação thus exist in a relationship in which the acceptance of one form seems to necessitate the vilification of the other. And sometimes this relationship is less than subtle. Some graffiti artists, for example, are even commissioned by the city as a form of preventing pixação (Pereira 2010). Thus, more attention needs to be given to interrogating the relationship between graffiti and pixação and the ways in which celebrating graffiti as a marker or local identity can also be a destructive act. Who does this identity formation benefit and who does it denigrate?
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"ART AS CRIME CRIME AS ART"
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Violence, hate, and difference
It is thus clear that the distinctions made between pixação and graffiti are not merely aesthetic ones, but rather move past the realm of the visual and have real impacts on the bodies of those who practice these modes of expression. The way that pixadores are conceived of by the city at large—as irrational, dirty, violent—also seems to translate to the way in which police officers treat them. The pixadores interviewed in João Weiner’s documentary, for example, recount tales of being brutalized by police officers, of being taunted and painted on, of being thrown in the river, of being forced to eat paint. The hostility that many citizens of São Paulo feel towards pixadores becomes concretized in these moments of violent interaction.
These moments of violence are also revealing of attempts to construct a homogenous population in which difference is not tolerated. Alison Young (2013: p.99) notes how “the censure and criminalization of graffiti fits a pattern in which difference is abjured as a means of discursive regulation.” Beyond recognizing the way in which violence against pixadores is harmful to their bodies, it is therefore also essential to recognize the work that this violence does in sustaining a model in which alternative means of occupying space are deemed unacceptable. This model suggests a city that is not formed by those who inhabit it—as Lefebvre (1996) proposed in his description of a right to the city that is "earned by living out the routines of everyday life in the spaces of the city"—but rather is controlled by a select few who are given the authority to decide what it means to acceptably exist within space.
And while hatred for pixadores has always existed to some degree throughout the history of pixação, it is perhaps worth considering the ways in which this violence may have intensified as a result of the changing place of graffiti within Paulista imaginary. While it may be impossible to draw a direct line of causation between these phenomena, a closer investigation into their potential correlation could be revealing in our understanding of the ways in which “acceptable” forms of mark making on the city can be extremely destructive to the lives of those who are not permitted into (or who do not want to be a part of) this category. This correlation, of course, would reveal important implications for discourses of criminality and marginalization both in São Paulo and beyond.
Amidst these moments of incredible violence and hatred, pixação continues to multiply on the walls of São Paulo. Pixadores continue to risk their lives in a hope that their existence will be acknowledged. They continue to seethe. The hiss from their cans of spray paint is only amplifying.
These moments of violence are also revealing of attempts to construct a homogenous population in which difference is not tolerated. Alison Young (2013: p.99) notes how “the censure and criminalization of graffiti fits a pattern in which difference is abjured as a means of discursive regulation.” Beyond recognizing the way in which violence against pixadores is harmful to their bodies, it is therefore also essential to recognize the work that this violence does in sustaining a model in which alternative means of occupying space are deemed unacceptable. This model suggests a city that is not formed by those who inhabit it—as Lefebvre (1996) proposed in his description of a right to the city that is "earned by living out the routines of everyday life in the spaces of the city"—but rather is controlled by a select few who are given the authority to decide what it means to acceptably exist within space.
And while hatred for pixadores has always existed to some degree throughout the history of pixação, it is perhaps worth considering the ways in which this violence may have intensified as a result of the changing place of graffiti within Paulista imaginary. While it may be impossible to draw a direct line of causation between these phenomena, a closer investigation into their potential correlation could be revealing in our understanding of the ways in which “acceptable” forms of mark making on the city can be extremely destructive to the lives of those who are not permitted into (or who do not want to be a part of) this category. This correlation, of course, would reveal important implications for discourses of criminality and marginalization both in São Paulo and beyond.
Amidst these moments of incredible violence and hatred, pixação continues to multiply on the walls of São Paulo. Pixadores continue to risk their lives in a hope that their existence will be acknowledged. They continue to seethe. The hiss from their cans of spray paint is only amplifying.
Pixação on the outskirts of São Paulo by #DI#, largely considered to be one of the most prolific pixadores in history
references
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educação e de cultura: o genocício, a precarização e o ativismo cultural. La utopía no está adelante:
generaciones, resistencias e instituciones emergentes. 286-290.
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Ventura, T. (2009). Hip-hop e graffiti: uma abordagem comparativa entre o Rio de Janeiro e São Paulo. Análise
Social, 605-634.s
Street Art. 440-451.
Bloch, S. (2012). The illegal face of wall space: Graffiti-murals on the sunset boulevard retaining walls.
Radical History Review, 2012(113).
Caldeira, T. (2015). Social Movements, Cultural Production, and Protests São Paulo’s Shifting Political
Landscape. Current Anthropology, 56(11), S126-S136.
Cresswell, T. (1996). In place-out of place: Geography, ideology, and transgression. Minneapolis: University
of Minnesota Press.
Ferrell, J., and Weide, R. D. (2010). Spot theory. City: Analysis of Urban Trends, Culture, Theory, Policy,
Action, 14(1-2).
Iveson, K. (2010). The wars on graffiti and the new military urbanism. City, 14(1-2).
Iveson, K. Cities within the City: Do-It-Yourself urbanism and the right to the city. International Journal of
Urban and Regional Research 37(3).
Kramer, R. (2010). Painting with Permission: Legal Graffiti in New York City. Ethnography. 11(2), 235-253.
Lefebvre, H. (1991). The production of space. Oxford: Blackwell.
Lefebvre, H. (1996) The right to the city. In E. Kofman and E. Lebas (eds.),Writings on cities: Henri Lefebvre,
Blackwell, Oxford.
McAuliffe, C., and Iveson, K (2011). Art and crime (and other things besides…): Conceptualising graffiti in the
city. Geography Compass, 5(3).
McAuliffe, C. (2013). Legal walls and professional paths: The mobilities of graffiti writers in Sydney. Urban
Studies, 50(3), 518–537.
Oliveira, R. C. A. (2013). Os Jovens das periferias de São Paulo e as políticas de segurança pública, de
educação e de cultura: o genocício, a precarização e o ativismo cultural. La utopía no está adelante:
generaciones, resistencias e instituciones emergentes. 286-290.
Pereira, A. (2012). Quem não é visto, não é lembrado: sociabilidade, escrita, visibilidade e memória na São
Paulo da pixação. Juventude e práticas culturais nas metrópoles. 1(2).
Pereira, A. (2010). As marcas da cidade: a dinâmica de pixação em São Paulo. Lua Nova: Revista de Cultura e
Política. 79.
Siwi, M. (2016). Pixação: the story behind São Paulo’s ‘angry’ alternative to graffiti. The Guardian.
Ventura, T. (2009). Hip-hop e graffiti: uma abordagem comparativa entre o Rio de Janeiro e São Paulo. Análise
Social, 605-634.s
image credits
https://vimeo.com/29691112
http://luc.devroye.org/anthropo.html
http://memoriasdaditadura.org.br/obras/pichacao-abaixo-ditadura-1968/
http://www.tucavieira.com.br/A-foto-da-favela-de-Paraisopolis
http://www.theguardian.com/cities/2016/jan/06/pixacao-the-story-behind-sao-paulos-angry-alternative-to-graffiti
http://ny2rio.com/?p=2292
http://www.manystuff.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/FC-book8.jpg
http://extra.globo.com/noticias/rio/386070-d1b-b91/w976h550/04_15_ghg_cristopichado1.jpg
http://besidecolors.com/category/pixacao-2/arquivosdapixacao/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edif%C3%ADcio_Copa
http://luc.devroye.org/anthropo.html
http://memoriasdaditadura.org.br/obras/pichacao-abaixo-ditadura-1968/
http://www.tucavieira.com.br/A-foto-da-favela-de-Paraisopolis
http://www.theguardian.com/cities/2016/jan/06/pixacao-the-story-behind-sao-paulos-angry-alternative-to-graffiti
http://ny2rio.com/?p=2292
http://www.manystuff.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/FC-book8.jpg
http://extra.globo.com/noticias/rio/386070-d1b-b91/w976h550/04_15_ghg_cristopichado1.jpg
http://besidecolors.com/category/pixacao-2/arquivosdapixacao/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edif%C3%ADcio_Copa
Refrain translation: Yeah I used to be a pixador. I loved it. I remember every second.