Morro da Macumba: Art and Community Development

One Friday in June, I took a bus an hour outside of the city to the residential park of Cocaia, one of many low-income communities clustered to the south of Sao Paulo. I was invited by Jonato and Paula, who grew up in the area, to visit their graffiti mural project, Morro da Macumba. The objective of Morro da Macumba was to “tell the history of the neighborhood’s construction” through a multimedia mural while beautifying the run-down neighborhood.

The visit to the exterior communities was eye opening for me. Though Cocaia has infrastructure like public transportation, electricity, and public schools, the trash collection is all but non-existent and makeshift houses are stacked up one atop the other. 

The Morro da Macumba mural took about a year to complete and involved collecting oral histories from residents, new and old, and involving the community in the creation of the mural and sculptures, relying heavily on found objects in the neighborhood (the tree pictured below is made from leaves cut from plastic bottles). The result is a colorful mural that parades along the facades of residences and businesses, and depicts the history of Cocaia from its undeveloped natural state, to the arrivals of immigrants from the northeast of Brazil, to the growth and evolution of the community and its residents. Opposite the main mural are written the oral testimonies they recorded from the local residents, many of whom were founders of the community.

Paula and Jonato told me about the community’s reaction to the project. Many residents who didn’t live on the mural route decided to paint their own homes or try their hands at graffiti. Teenagers who helped the artists on the project have been given their own walls to design elsewhere in the neighborhood. The residents have gotten used to outsiders, including foreigners like myself, visiting their neighborhood. The mural has become a source of local pride and identity.

The artists of Morro da Macumba will soon be headed to Santa Fe, New Mexico, where they will be in residence at the Santa Fe Art Institute. They hope to realize a related project within the immigrant community there.