Intervalo, respiro, pequenos deslocamentos – ações poéticas do Poro

Seen from a current perspective, Tales description fits São Paulo or any other
big city-machine like a glove; the city emphasizes impersonality through
individuality and maximizes its greatness through corporate investments of
mega enterprises, real estate speculation, cultural corridors and tourism. I
confess to sometimes feel lost and, at the same time, I can barely imagine that
I’m surrounded by such a great extension of networks and structures of global
capital… One must face the risks and cognitively map the various networks,
but it is extremely necessary to ask ourselves what we want and how we act in
this context. I say act as resistance that, however small it may be, can inspire
many people and reach a level that cannot be determined. Like a writing on
a wall, a performance, an image of a poster or an idea that later is replicated
by other thousands of people, capable of provoking a large demonstration. I
wonder what direct action a banner, created by the collective Poro, that is our
focus here, placed in the middle of the street with the sentence “Cross the
Appearances”, could have ignited to those who read it…
Why not propose in the city’s everyday life an attention to the art of small
things? Why not to rediscover the natural and subtle strength of looking
at the sky and imagining a project of memory and resistance, just like the
brief story of the reporter who fell in love with the idea of a journal about
Latin America, which I said initially? Or like the recent action of Poro, in
which a series of cards showing a picture of a bird were thrown from top of
a building located on Belo Horizonte’s main crossing, inviting the passersby
to admire a sensitive action and review his or her own relation to the city, to
the unexpected and to his or her own life.
My personal digression in this text has to do with the importance of touring
“around the world” with our actions, without forgetting where we have come
from and what we believe in. We have to listening to our dreams, goals and
memories. When I remember old Marcão and my experience with activists
and art collectives in Brazil – where Poro is one of my main references – I
suddenly realize that my contact has shown me the actual importance of
being part of procedures of change. More than anything, I want to say that
I admire the people and collectives who have taught me that resistance is
political, as well as poetic, when one participates with others in a protest,
intervenes in a street or a community, tells stories, prepares lessons or
writes a stimulating text. Just as I believe that when one transposes a direct
action 6 from the field of social action into the realm of art, one engages
and commits oneself to what one wants and fights. If I could scream now
6. Direct action, in the words of Murray Bookchin, is "the means by which individuals can
take direct control of society without turning to representatives (...), a sensitivity which should
include and interest all aspects of our lives and our behavior." See BOOKCHIN, Murray. Textos
Dispersos. Lisboa: SOCIUS, 1998. p. 18.
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