Since its creation, INarteurbana has contributed directly and in the long term to the cultural and artistic education of needy young people, as well as to their social inclusion and that of their families. Considering that the project does not necessarily focus on the work of art, but on the use of art to reach other political and social issues, we can consider that the proposal is inserted in the idea of cultural activism or even artivism.
Immediately, cultural activism tends to approach anti-art, by eliminating the artistic object in favor of social intervention inspired by aesthetics and by disregarding contemplation for the benefit of community involvement. In this doing, the subjects
they produce concepts or practices, based on a keen critical awareness carried by the individual artist or a collective.
Artivism is distinguished by the use of collaborative methods of carrying out the work and disseminating the results obtained. In this way, direct participation is characteristic of this type of political art, configuring situations that range from the critical artist to the engaged or militant. The INarteurbana project is located within a social relationship, that is, it engenders a relational sphere based on the desire for struggle, responsibility, or social vocation that recognizes the existence of conflicts to be faced immediately. Therefore, the recognition of the other and also the critique of the conditions that produce contemporaneity becomes fundamental in artivism. In this strong social involvement, the autonomy of art has thus been reduced and, on the other hand, the relationship between ethics and aesthetics has widened.
Therefore, it can be said that the generating nucleus of the practice is the attitude towards art and the surrounding reality. This is how attitude and social intervention are carried out as procedural activities, both in form and method. Against the object and its distribution system, the market, the process and the tactic inside it, in search of both the configuration of a language and the positive result of the action.
The project has taken place in the Passo da Pátria community since 2015. A peripheral community with high rates of drug trafficking and violence, it is recognized as a “zone of social interest” by local public institutions. With actions of readaptation and reappropriation of public space, INarteurbana has a strong impact on the daily life of the community and local territorial development.
The project contributes not only to accentuate the positive and affective image towards the population of the region but mainly to empower the inhabitants themselves in their surroundings, who with this initiative will be able to unfold other attitudes that can help in a movement of change and appropriation of the living space.
Over the years, INarteurbana has provided the necessary tools so that the inhabitants can carry out projects and collective actions and thus reactivate and/or strengthen a neighborhood dynamic. Actions aimed at children and teenagers have been, since the beginning, a great motivation for the team and residents who see in this new possibilities beyond the local reality.
