Construto Urbano: Cidade e identidade

by Alexandra Chaptiska @chaptiska

(Automatically translated from Portuguese) Show original

Introduction

Identity: Urban construct.

I love my city. I was born and raised here. And I rebuild myself every day. The urban landscape outside my window helps me create, give life, poetry and expression to my art. In it, I rest my gaze from work, contemplating the movement and life outside my window. I discover the poetry hidden in every corner. And I return to making art. Art is my expression.
In this project, a family event changed my plans. This is not the right time to think about art. I am in crisis. But I persist: I need to finish what I started, and in art I find my cure, in the midst of a marital crisis.
I look at my drafts and reflect: I was constituted in the city, so identity is an urban construct in my "case".
And me? _I'm in crisis: "Affair" or not "affair"?

Supplies

white A4 paper 120gsm, old magazines, sheets and a natural and dry rose petal; graphite (pencil shavings), green oil pastel chalk shavings (because I didn't have dry or wax chalk on hand), black wool, crochet hook (not necessary), scissors and white glue.

So many ideas and decisions and changes of plans

My drawing desk is in front of a window where I can rest my mind and enjoy the urban landscape of where I live. I like to watch the movement of cars and people. I imagine where they are going and what they are doing. I like to watch life happening on the streets while I feed the birds that visit the tree in front of my apartment. I see that my horizon is a gray grid of buildings, and I love to see the ashen rain covering and displacing the distant leaden horizon. I watch the construction of increasingly taller buildings, making the entire city even grayer with their shadows, taking the sun away from our squares. I think about how much our trees fight for space in the sun and grow taller and taller too. I decide to portray this dispute: nature versus city, gray versus green, concrete versus fragility, stability versus hope; in greater São Paulo, a Universe of buildings, progress, and urban life; but also of people, birds and plants that adapt and learn to live with the solidity of gray.
In this stage of this project, I walk around the city taking photos that portray this dispute. The first photo I take is of my desk, glued to the window where I work. Outside, the bus and subway complex with its buildings steals space from the resilient trees in the square between the viaducts.
Then I take a series of photos of squares, parks and subway stations, or the view that these places provide, especially where nature seems to overcome (and not the opposite) the space, covering the buildings.
Looking at the photos, I thought about what I want to portray of myself and the city, the elements, techniques and colors.
Inspired by the courses I am taking at Domestika, I decide which ideas I will use. I thought about the stencil technique that is widely used in street graffiti in my city; I also thought about a drawing of a spray paint bottle to convey the ideology of urban art. In this same language, I chose the collage technique, using as texture for the buildings texts from magazines, representing lambe-lambes (a form of urban art that consists of posting posters on walls and public spaces), and dried natural foliage, which I love and collect (I have been obsessed with collecting them on my walks since I was little). The colors I chose are: shades of gray, like the ones I have seen from my window on these rainy days, where the gray sky blends with the gray of the buildings, giving an air of heaviness, solidity, and stability. In contrast, I chose shades of green, representing nature, hope, fertility, and renewal. A touch of red, bringing boldness, desire, and provocation; and black, as an outliner, a constraint, giving order and power. The mosaic stones, the ephemerality, as if to say: what is built with newness, also destroys what was there before, and is soon also surpassed by the new, in an endless cycle.
What I chose to teach the reader was initially the chain stitch embroidered on paper, but then I changed my mind and switched to another handmade chain stitch, in crochet, to avoid piercing the paper (there is a risk of peeling off the delicate sheets). I chose this stitch and technique to print links, union, community and chain, and also to bring my feminine ancestry. I learned to embroider and crochet as a child, taught by my mother and grandmother. With crochet, my mother and grandmother supported the family, in the same city that I portray. In my art, crochet outlines the contour of my face, drawn in front of the mirror, to show that my identity is urban, but brings family feminine empowerment. I was born, raised, graduated, worked, retired and still live and love this concrete jungle that is São Paulo, Brazil. I stopped working this week, because I am going through a very difficult time, and I ended up away from home, and without my materials, I had to change and improvise, but I am happy to have managed to finish. When I looked at my finished work, I realized that there was a relief within me. Relief that only art and poetry can give us. Art is, and will always be, my cure.

Minha escrivaninha de desenho fica defronte uma janela onde posso descansar minha mente apreciando a paisagem urbana de onde eu moro. Gosto de ver o movimento do trânsito de carros e de pessoas. Imagino para onde estão indo e o que fazem. Gosto de ver a vida acontecendo nas ruas enquanto alimento pássaros visitantes da árvore defronte ao meu apartamento .Vejo que meu horizonte é um quadriculado grisalho de prédios, e adoro ver a chuva cinérea encobrir e desquadricular o plúmbeo horizonte distante. Acompanho as contruções de prédios cada vez mais altos, acinzentando ainda mais toda cidade com suas sombras retirando o sol das nossas praças. Penso o quanto nossas árvores disputam lugar ao sol e crescem cada vez mais altas também. Decido retratar essa disputa: natureza versus cidade, cinza versus verde, concreto versus fragilidade, estabilidade versus esperança; na grande São Paulo, um Universo de prédios, de progresso, e de vida urbana; mas também de gente, de pássaros e plantas que se adaptam e aprendem a conviver com a solidez do cinza.
Nesta etapa deste projeto, passeio pela cidade tirando fotos que retratem esta disputa. A primeira foto que tiro é da minha escrivaninha, colada a janela onde trabalho. Lá fora o complexo de ônibus e metrô com suas construções roubando o espaço das resilientes árvores da praça entre os viadutos.
Depois tiro uma série de fotos de praças, parques e estações de metrô, ou a visão que estes lugares proporcionam, principalmente onde a natureza parece vencer ( e não o oposto) o espaço, encobrindo os prédios.
Olhando as fotos, pensei no que quero retratar de mim e da cidade, nos elementos,nas técnicas e cores.
Inspirada nos cursos que estou fazendo na Domestika; decido quais idéias vou utilizar. Pensei na técnica stencil muito usada na grafitagem das ruas na minha cidade; também um desenho de um frasco de tinta spray para imprimir a ideologia da arte urbana. Nesta mesma linguagem, escolho a técnica da colagem, aproveitando como textura para os prédios, de textos de revistas, representando os lambe-lambes (forma de arte urbana que consiste em afixar cartazes ou pôsteres em muros e espaços públicos), folhagens naturais desidratadas, que adoro e coleciono ( tenho mania de colher nos meus passeios desde pequena). As cores escolhidas são: Tons de cinza, como tenho visto da minha janela nestes dias chuvosos, onde o céu acinzentado se mistura ao cinza dos prédios, imprimindo ar pesado, solidez e estabilidade. Em contraste escolhi tons de verde, da natureza, da esperança, da fertilidade e da renovação. Um toque de vermelho, trazendo a ousadia, o desejo, a provocação; e o preto delineador, limitador, imprimindo ordem e poder. As pedras de mosaico,a efemeridade, como que dizendo: o que se constrói de novidade, também destrói o que havia anteriormente, e logo também é superado pelo novo, num ciclo sem fim.
O que escolhi para ensinar o leitor foi o inicialmente o ponto corrente bordado no papel, mas depois mudei de idéia, troquei por outro ponto corrente artesanal, no crochê, para evitar furar o papel, ( há risco de descolar as delicadas folhas), e escolhi este ponto e técnica para imprimir elo, união, comunidade e corrente, e também trazendo a minha ancestrealidade feminina. Aprendi a bordar e a crochetar quando criança ensinados pela minha mãe e avó. Com o crochê, minha mãe e avó sustetavam a familia, na mesma cidade que eu retrato. Na minha arte o crochê delineia o contorno do meu rosto,desenhado diante do espelho, para mostrar que minha identidade é urbana, mas traz o empoderamento feminino familiar. Nasci, cresci, me formei, trabalhei, me aposentei e ainda vivo e amo esta selva de pedra que é São Paulo, Brasil. Interrompi o trabalho esta semana, porque vivo um momento muito dificil,e acabei fora de casa, e sem ter meus materiais, tive que mudar e improvisar, mas contente por conseguir terminar . Ao olhar minha obra pronta, percebi que havia em mim um alívio. Alívio que só a arte e a poesia nos dá. A arte é, e sempre será minha cura.

from idea to paper

Time to draw the elements that were thought of, described in the previous step, and prepare the materials and techniques. In the photo, the first lines. The outline of the buildings were cut out to apply the stencil technique (hollow mold). The spray paint can mold that was thought of at the beginning was replaced by a single spray can and used to complete my face (I loved this change, I'm a bit of a rebel) but also to hide an accident (a mistake) that occurred with the pastel chalk (oily chalk is not the best option for this technique, but it was what I had at the time).

Graffitiing

Graffiti, in urban art, is a form of popular expression that consists of painting colorful murals using the stencil technique (a hollow mold, when painting on fabric). Screen printing arose from this premise. Here I graffitied using graphite, that is, pencil powder... So here I could say graffiti squared (potency: a mathematical concept, and I loved this coincidence, because potency is power, it is to empower!). Graffiti (urban art) times Graphite (inside of the pencil). I used my finger, which results in a nice texture. Oh, my fingerprints being rubbed on the paper and causing dirt (chaos) for later art (healing).
I chose to teach how I made the chain that outlines my face and recorded a video.
I was going to do the embroidery chain stitch, but I changed my mind and decided to do it using a chain stitch - the basic crochet stitch (both craft techniques) which gives the same effect as embroidery and there is no need to pierce the paper. In the link there are two videos, where I teach how to do the chain stitch without a needle and then with a crochet hook. https://www.canva.com/design/DAGrxA4m8X4/ImctrdoMhOBc_c_mLdx1tg/edit