Supersense

This week YT returned from a trip to Sao Paulo, Brazil with staff from CSM 3D, which included a concussion of visits to suburban favelas, occupied houses and the downtown city centre over eight days. Whilst the density of this experience may take a while to digest, the lasting impression of so many new faces, places and situations is intense.

Our aim, minuscule in the city scale, a mission to expose value in the collaborative use of Active Archiving, 3D Photogrammetry and DIY networking we named Reverso.

Utilising the Mazi toolkit beta, we pulled it all together in Portuguese and published to it’s integrated offline webserver then presented for local access over a series of wireless hotspots introduced during workshops. A glimpse of this process is now reflected at the public website where we will continue to integrate insights and ideas that promote positive reaction.

For so many there, a change in fortunes is overdue but despite the growing international call for awareness and action in response to deepening poverty and despair, it’s going to be left to those facing the gravest precariousness to find a way out of their respective difficulties. These seem like the longest odds but the alternatives are less than palatable for those on such fringes.

An emergent architecture, however fragile, spans the ravine around which, communities, families and lives are assembled and lived out. Sunlight rarely makes ground in the most densely stacked favela infrastructures. Power cables and plumbing snake at head height. Faces peer in and out of the windowless spaces as we tread carefully along back alleys and scale stairs. The aged, infant and indolent weave past us and throughout the timeless structures of towering brick and corrugated roofing. Which century are we in again? images

Somewhere there out of reach, something less reasonable lurks unchecked. Stray offline here at considerable risk, for these are hard fought territories and the trust on show is paper thin. Out on the street, police cars speed recklessly between traders, cyclists and residents.

Our visit draws to a close with optimism for community led reconstruction.. rehousing at this scale a formidable challenge, non the less possible for the great humanity evident, the self awareness and determination is irresistible ! [images]

 

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