Exploring São Paulo's Visual Culture: Encounters with Art and Street Culture along Augusta Street

Abstract

This paper contributes an initial venture into thinking about the uses of urban space in the context of leisure and contemporary urban life in São Paulo, Brazil. Looking at different urban spaces of leisure along Augusta Street, this paper analyzes the social, frenetic, and yet intimate spaces in São Paulo that were transformed and revived in the last few years. It examines Vídeo Guerrilha, an annual three-day video arts festival on Augusta Street. It also observes the revival of the neighborhood of Lower Augusta/Baixo Augusta in São Paulo, which is in progress and closer to the city center and, more specifically, the “bad” side of Avenida Paulista, the active artery that separates downtown from upscale neighborhoods in the city's southwest zone. It focuses on visual and urban street culture along Augusta and the two parallel avenues that flank it, Bela Cintra Street and Frei Caneca Street. The urban dynamic is reflected in the city's urban landscapes and shows a constant tension between opposite realms: global–local, private–public, and the individual–collective.