Sao Paulo's street art

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Sao Paulo high rises with slums in the foreground

I have been watching off and on a programme titled “This is Brazil” on the TV. This programme commenced sometime around the Football World Cup. A Brazilian-born Australian, Fernanda de Paula anchors the half-hour (in fact 20-minute minus the infernal ads) programme and takes one on a tour of Brazil covering its economy, football, its favelas, the Amazon River and forests on its banks and the (native) Indian settlements. I have watched a few that showed the Rio, Brasilia,

Street art on Batman Alley, Sao Paulo

Amazon River, etc.

Yesterday the programme was on Sao Paulo that is considered to be the biggest city in the Southern hemisphere. The first section of the programme dealt with the wall graffiti in Sao Paulo. It was interesting to see graffiti being used as a means of expressing the repressed feelings

Our own Elephant God in residence in Sao Paulo

or pent up anger. The deprived of the city have taken to expressing themselves through their art on the walls. Despite the rapid economic growth of Brazil its inequalities show up through its slums, which are called favelas. Unlike Rio de Janiero, the Sao slums are generally relegated to the outskirts of the city - on the edge of a mesh of high rises.

I found some of the graffiti beautiful and some others being of massive proportions – unlike the ones one comes across in Europe

Another street with beautiful graffiti

which appear somewhat furtive and generally in less frequented or isolated places.  These mostly are cryptic messages written in stylised form with aerosol paint. Almost all countries of the West have witnessed wall graffiti, also known as street art and some even organise street art festivals. Sao Paulo is known for its street art. In my searches I found one even on our Elephant God Ganesh. Graffiti is a hugely interesting subject and one comes across some freshand also some weird expressions in the shape of street art.

I am uploading five photographs taken from the Internet to give an idea of Sao Paulo as a city and its street art.

Sao Paulo - trying to reach for the sky