Back in 2014, a 13-story building in downtown São Paulo was occupied by more than a hundred Latin American artists. In the process they created Ouvidor 63, the largest art squat in Latin America.
In 2017, Argentinian artist and director Matias Borgström came across the building and was immediately intrigued. He moved in for a weekend and set up a 2-day installation on one of the floors. On the Saturday, folk in the squat were suspicious. On the Sunday they were fully engaged, so much so that Borgström was invited to return and chronicle the prep for an art biennale that was planned for the following year.
That in itself was potentially problematic as Ouvidor 63 had entered into a sponsorship partnership with Red Bull, much to the consternation of the hard-nosed anti-capitalists who abhorred the idea of a multi-national having any kind of corporate involvement.
“A significant layer of the documentary delves into the ongoing discourse surrounding the commercialization of artistic production,” Borgström writes in his film notes. “While some residents advocate for external support and recognition, others express concerns about the potential ‘elitization’ of their creative expressions. This intricate conflict encompasses communal decisions that transcend simple resolution.”
The Ouvidor squat may have invoked the Summer of Love with its artistic freedom and epicurean approach to existence – every end-of-day residents would go to the market to ask for unsold produce to be donated – but life there could certainly throw up complications.
“Yes, we started to understand that this community was way more complex,” Borgström tells BDE. “Each of the 13 floors was dedicated to a different art expression. One floor was for yoga, one for body art, and then the third floor was for punk rock bands. And they had a studio to record bands from there. And then they had another floor for woodwork and they were building things for the building. Then you had tattoo, and then we started to meet other people who weren’t even involved in the biennial. Some people didn’t like the idea of the biennial and others didn’t even know it was happening. So little by little we started to understand that we couldn’t have much control of the situation…So I embraced this role of a story listener instead. Ouvidor in English means ‘listener.’”
Another core theme in the film is security of tenure and squatters’ rights, especially after an adjacent block, also used as a squat, becomes a towering inferno due to faulty wiring. (The footage we see of its collapse is dramatic and harrowing.) So the local authority wants the artists out of Ouvidor, but when a team of inspectors come round they are reasonably impressed by the set-up and are even happy to advise the tenants on how to make it safer.
That said, the housing situation in Sao Paolo is poor, as is made evident in the film, with 588,000 vacant residences in the city and 529 squats housing approximately 115,00- residents, many of whom are entire families. The end of the film quotes a figure of 11.4 million empty residences across all of Brazil, and a homeless number of 17 million.
Throughout, the film offers an overwhelming sense both of vibrancy and immediacy as the various conflicts unfold, all the time counterpointed by performance. “I like documentaries that, instead of speaking about things in the past, [show] what’s happening in the present. So when the spectator who’s watching the film is surprised by something that is happening, me, as the director, I’m also surprised,” says Borgström.
“It is very intriguing to be there. Things are really happening. They’re really fighting to make things happen. And they’re really strong as a community, as a self-managed horizontal community,” he adds, even despite the tendency towards polarization within the group. “So you have all these conflicts inside the squat for sure but, still, it really works out.”
The film may be receiving its German premiere 18 months after its completion, but director Borgström is still actively using it as a tool for social Impact. “There’s a lot of architects, lawyers and people who really admire the Ouvidor movement and are always giving support to them, so they have good allies,” he says. “So we are showing the film in many places and we are making a lot of Q&As and discussions and bringing politicians and journalists and people from the government also to discuss the issues it raises.”
“Last week we showed it to 400 students from the public schools from Brazil. So we had a lot of teachers very interested, and we showed it in the important Faculty of Architecture and Urbanism, University of São Paulo. We are showing it in institutions and we are bringing these very important people who can make a difference from inside the system,” he adds.
“This film is always the start of discussion where people from nowadays can come and discuss what is happening in this new reality and to understand more about our system and our fight, and our resistance.”
In his notes, Borgström further sums up his belief in the film as a template for change, or an alternative design for living. “Rather than mainly highlighting social issues in their [the artists’] daily lives, we emphasize their resilience, determination and capacity to learn from their experiences, whether they lead to success or setbacks. My intention is for the audience not only to become acquainted with Ouvidor’s microcosm but also to experience its vibrancy first-hand, igniting a similar passion within them.”
International sales of Ouvidor are handled by JMT Films.
