ISUF 2015 XXII international Conference: City as organism.

New visions for urban life

Imageability, image building forces and phases, and everyday choices of Utopia –
the immaterial urban heritage of Rio de Janeiro 1

Thereza Christina Couto Carvalho

Faculty member of the Pos-Graduate Program in Architecture and Urbanism, Universidade Federal Fluminense, Brasil
Alex Assunção Lamounier
PhD student, Pos-Graduate Program in Architecture and Urbanism, Universidade Federal Fluminense, Brasil

Keywords: Rio de Janeiro, utopia, immaterial urban heritage, organic urban growth

Introduction: the Utopia in everyday life - the Carioca way of life

"the principle of utopia is to circumscribe a place that doesn't exist anywhere else: this is to delimit
and a modular space in which and with which a community is going to live by new rules it is fact a
rupture with the surrounding world, a space shutdown". (in Thierry Paquot, 1999. "Utopia-essays
about the ideal", Rio de Janeiro: Difel, p. 91).
The recognition of a city image associated with the enjoyment of public spaces and even artistic
inspiration, was one of the propositions of the document approving inclusion of Rio de Janeiro as
Cultural landscape on the World Heritage list of humanity. The proposal associates the carioca way
of life to the "exceptional urban setting in the city, consisting of essential natural elements that
shape and inspire their development". Thus, the world heritage site, approved by the Committee,
includes "urban landscapes designed to enhance open air activities and permanence. The
proposition takes "principles of identification of cultural landscapes" involving criteria such as
"intentionally designed landscape", "scenery" and "evolutionary landscape organically linked to the
history and inseparable from the imaginary country for centuries". It stresses, furthermore, that "in
Rio e Janeiro, the symbiosis between the city and the landscape is unique, even more striking than
the values of the historic site itself, of monuments and architecture" (UNESCO, 7/2/2012). The
tipping, in traditional molds, aiming to ' freeze ' a given image in a desired state, can, contrary to
popular belief, brings, lead to emptying of the meanings associated with it. Such preservation
depends on much more than a continuing maintenance process, which takes into account the
understanding of landscape evolution, rather than a normative definition. Discussions about the
possibilities of understanding and maintenance of this carioca lifestyle have led to the search for
methods of interpretation that illuminate the process. It is a foray into the study of morphology of
public spaces under effect of dynamic urban setting processes practiced in everyday life. Therefore,
the purpose is not micro morphology, but the middle range morphology, the spatial scale of the

1
This article reproduces, for the most part, speech given by T. Carvalho on the Polis, the public, the desire and enjoyment: utopia in
everyday life, in Symposium held on effects of architecture, held in December 2013, at the UFF. About utopia in everyday life and
points to the role that the enjoyment and pleasure, here understood as characteristic of the carioca way of life, engaged in the setting
of the city of Rio de Janeiro by integrating its so-called intangible heritage. The Catete fieldwork and methodological application was
conducted by doctoral student, A. Lamounier, and was added as a case study.

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ISUF 2015 XXII international Conference: City as organism. New visions for urban life

public in public, made of individual, cumulative appropriations of public spaces, here understood as
walks and sidewalks, plazas and wide, interstitial spaces between buildings and streets. The
evolutionary approach adopted is consistent with the Conzenian school, and with the urban
configuration processes detected in Rio de Janeiro.
It focuses on how humans relate to space as it addresses the role that the physical environment plays
intertwining our lives to places and to place making. The changes that these public spaces have
undergone, in some circumstances, have helped to aggregate new uses, and to consolidate them,
allowing necessary links between the existing grid with all its multiple functions, shapes and values,
and new urban expansions. In other circumstances, other changes have helped to condemn and to
lose functional urban tissue and related networks of uses, meanings and values, and social related
constructions and expectations (Carvalho and Coelho, 2009).
………………………………………………………………

Methodology

"... space as a simultaneity of stories so far." (Doreen Massey, 2009, p. 33)

The methodological procedure adopted addresses the interrelationships between public space and
the public. It focuses on the visible traces of individual cumulative space appropriations, the forces
of attraction and aggregation triggered by those users and usages. Those forces, and attributes in
various qualitative dimensions define forces of configuration, forms and functions of street level
stores that configure the square borders. Together they often fire ripple effects enhancing vitality,
defining different levels of centralities. Together, at the same time and space, and in sequence, those
forces often show signs of consolidation with prospects of permanence, identity and appreciation of
belonging. The vitality as product and producer of active forces, induces attraction and aggregation,
and consolidation and tradition enhancement possibilities, which the public space and the public
sphere, in different circumstances, encourage, permit, condone or reject. It reaffirms the affinity of
the concept of vitality with the space as sphere of possibilities of multiplicities/plurality and...
where distinct trajectories coexist, in permanent interrelation. Therefore, for the purpose of the
approach adopted here, the space is not a repository of inherited identities, already incorporated and
legitimized by the dominant narrative is not a palimpsest of ordered layers, but rather its building
site. The perception of these multiple perspectives-materialized in distinct spatial practices and
forms of ownership, in different times, based on different interrelated dimensions and scales –
favors the recognition of distinct urban configuration processes. To these multiple processes
frequently correspond different views about beauty, pleasure and enjoyment that public spaces of
various natures, with distinct qualities, under certain conditions, can offer.

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ISUF 2015 XXII international Conference: City as organism. New visions for urban life

Fig 1a and 1b: tv set on a trolley car parked on the sidewalk. Time for a smoke enjoying his “siesta” watching tv.

From this condition of analysis emerge other possibilities of reading space, different from static
content, inert, closed, and representation, with which that is often associated. Appropriate spatial
reading, and its representation, the content lived, relational, multiple, heterogeneous, is an
exhilarating challenge. Their results, to the extent that can generate evidence of benefits to
recognize and accept the "other" on their differences, can reflect positively on the generation of new
public policies, not homogenizing, nor reductionist or banal. The liberating purpose justifies the
effort.

Analytical categories

This paper addresses public open spaces based on six here called genetic dimensions, or genes of
the cultural heritage of a city and its grid. These genes are the economic, social, morphological,
environmental, and organizational dimensions, together with accessibility and mobility as a
determinant condition. These dimensions are intertwined in the landscape according to four
functional and spatial related patterns of social interaction - attraction, aggregation, consolidation,
“value added tradition” (a different perspective on VAT). The first pattern relies on one necessary
existing singularity - in any of the former six genetic dimensions, which attracts the eye and the
mind of the passing observer. The second pattern deals with fruition that aggregates multiple uses
and customers. The consolidation pattern follows. It derives from the multiple invested interests
when and where the previous newly found uses and customers made place. Value added tradition
and identity built in the process, with different meanings added by different “whom’s” finalizes the
sequence. The sequence follows itself in a cycle. These functional-spatial patterns characterize how
each one of the former dimensions relate to each other and what functional spatial links they appear

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ISUF 2015 XXII international Conference: City as organism. New visions for urban life

to establish with the adjacent urban area. They have been associated to the process of sedimentation
that knit them together and that distinguishes them as a genetic code (Carvalho, 2009).

Qualitative dimensions of the place

Morphological dimension – addresses physical characteristics of the built environment including

sizes, shapes, volumes and types of public spaces and its banks, including alignment and profile
constructions, shape and dimensions of public space. Also topography – declivities, stairs and
slopes; installment-shape and dimension of the block and lot, typologies; streets, dimensions
compared routes and sidewalks; buildings – feedback, types of open and closed; paving, tree
planting and colour; street furniture-benches, statues and kiosks and lighting.

Institutional dimension - addresses the characteristics relating to property and management (public,
private, semi-public spaces), representations of public power and the presence of public institutions-
schools, hospitals, churches, barracks, and standards of land use and occupation.

The economic dimension – addresses commercial uses, stores small, medium and large companies,
for the provision of services and industrial production, in various business scales, as well as
financial agencies and ATM.

Social/cultural dimensions: - addresses various forms of space appropriations related to social

encounters, exhibitions, artistic events, meetings for collective games. It also deals with attributes
and forces of configuration that enhance image-building references associated with cultural identity.

Fruition and pleasure benefit from the attractiveness of these public spaces. Contemplation, tasting,
social gatherings and artistic manifestations, allow for experiences and memories that induce
belonging and build identity. The content of identity emerges from this configuration process,
building places that represent different social groups and, in a continuous process, stimulating more
meaningful space appropriations and building place tradition. The ideal of "public art", the street
theater of Rio de Janeiro, relates to the utopian image of a “carioca way of life”, "so that Rio de
Janeiro doesn't become like any other city in Northern Europe, so that Rio de Janeiro is the Rio de
Janeiro" (Haddad, 2015 -107). It's intangible heritage is a component of city, associated with the
way of life, to the local culture.

Singularities, attractiveness, vitality, the public spaces constitute spatial singularities in the fabric of
the city, attracting a variety of potentially forming appropriation centers. Once known, it attracts
social conviviality and visible vitality. It covers a variety of meanings: a) accessible to any person;
b) houses State institutions; c) allows enjoyment and social gatherings; d) represents identities
(public recognition) and a critical role (public opinion); and the urban mesh) organizes, permanence
and population flow. Among its essential physical attributes is the morphological uniqueness that
distinguishes in the mesh and that, as such, permeates the margins. This attracts other compatible
and complementary uses, economic, social, cultural, which enhance the attractiveness of the place.
With these attributes, squares and streets, aggregate visibility, and induce the configuration of
different levels of centrality.

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ISUF 2015 XXII international Conference: City as organism. New visions for urban life

Different attributes and qualitative dimensions seem to favor the consolidation of public spaces as
points of attraction in the city. The uniqueness of urban form, perimeter and volumetric, and plastic
beauty, coupled with visibility, it certainly attracts, however, if public access and forms of
occupation and consolidation are not adequately regulated with fairness, and firmly, what are public
assets shall become exclusive to few, and excluding, for everyone else. Brasília, DF, illustrates the
argument. Intended to mirror a desired future, it defined an admired showcase for certain employees
and pushed out of the visible scenery, and the possibilities of life that offered, everyone else.
Prejudice has consolidated exclusion and opportunism did the rest.

Attractive singularities exist in multiple dimensions. In the so-called organic/spontaneous urban

contexts of unplanned areas, permission to use attracts Taguatinga, satellite city of Brasilia,
illustrating this point. The singularity in the regulatory permission of satellite-city, in opposition to
the rigidity of the standards of occupation of Brasilia, attracted the installation of companies and
businesses in its perimeter by transforming it from satellite city into market town. Thirty years after
inauguration Taguatinga became the dynamic economic core of the Federal District, important
businesses converged together with a large number of people, initiatives and intentions.

This singularity of regulatory leniency does not relate, only, to the formation process of
'spontaneous' settlements, and the condition of illegality, of environmental and urban insecurity,
anyway, of disservice to town. Research conducted in medieval urban fabrics revealed similar
performance concerning the forms of occupation, mutual recognition, with greater variation in the
rhythms of urban change.

……………………………

Forming process" Organically Evolutionary Landscape" in Rio de Janeiro-Largo do Machado and

Catete Street.

The configuration processes called either organic or spontaneous defines ongoing urban
transformations of originally planned areas, also of irregular, informal and illegal “spontaneous”
settlements as well as changes and mutations on pre-existing historic urban fabric. It deals with
attributes, dimensions, strength and stages identified in different patterns of space appropriation
identified at the edges of open public spaces, between squares and streets.

The ongoing research, on the DNA of the urban fabric and the role that public spaces performs on
the formation of centralities (Carvalho, since 2008), revealed different rhythms of change and
signalized three aspects of the configuration process: it is cyclic, simultaneous and with multiple 2.
A singular feature triggers an initial attraction, perceived for both enjoyment and pleasure as for
other features. Perceived attraction triggers possible aggregations, in successive stages, of new uses
for individual cumulative and successive appropriations, consolidating new urban forms, which in
turn attract more. The collective recognition of perceived belonging and relationship forming

2
Preliminary results of the ongoing research point out certain conditions, so that the public space can exercise that role –
accessibility and mobility. The active presence of the public authority also helps.

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ISUF 2015 XXII international Conference: City as organism. New visions for urban life

underlie public recognition of identity tradition. These forces and sediment phases still weave
different time and space relations on the shaft and analyzed.

The convergence of different scales – physical, temporal and business, are important attributes of
the morphological richness of Rio de Janeiro. Rua do Catete (Catete Street) is a good example of
cumulative initiatives of different individuals and collectivities that add up to the configuration of
the morphology of the set. The earthen floors of the buildings situated along the road were suitable
for trades and services, of different natures, with varying levels of organization and concentration of
capital and information. The street offers products and services, including ATMs, retail, public
spaces, and museums at zero cost. And the set serves the city and the public, on the shapes and on
the roles that it reveals.

The chosen axis structures the formation of the town. It received several denominations: King’s
Road, path to Praia Vermelha, Catete Road, Road to Botafogo. Between 1808 and 1812, it
guaranteed the strategic connection between the colonial Government Palace, in the urban core of
the Rio de Janeiro, to the hill of the Church of Our Lady of the Glory – and the rural areas of
supply, nearby 3. The increasing intensification of traffic on this route attracted successive individual
cumulative appropriations of plots along its course, signalizing its importance as structuring route
for urban growth (Bacon, 1983). Subsequent actions of the public authorities, of building standards
and alignment, drainage, grounding and channeling rivers, propitiated the consolidation of this road
as a valued route, and, in sequence, reinforced its role as attractive place for economic, social and
cultural uses.

These actions have attracted the interest of different social groups, consolidating itself in other
forms of urban appropriation, including higher income families that chose to distance themselves
from congested urban center. The neighborhoods of Lapa, Glória, Catete, Flamengo and Botafogo,
were thus configured (Abreu, 1987, p. 37) undergoing remarkable growth between 1821 and 1838.
The original large plots of those neighborhoods served agricultural purposes. Those neighborhoods,
described in short stories, chronicles and romances written at the end of the 19th century, became
references for the national and enhanced attractiveness, value and perceived identity of the area.

As a result of forces and stages of development, the consolidation of these early occupations
materialized in different urban forms, resulting in prestige and reinforced identity for both the
Catete route and the square. Several individual cumulative appropriations of blocks and lots to its
margin added meanings and value to Largo do Machado and Catete Street, still in the 19th century.
They reflect its recognition, by the user population and resident, as singular attractive space,
demanding equal investments from the public sector. As an example, the fact that in 1841, this
Largo being chosen as one of the important areas of the city to be lit for the celebration of the
coronation of Dom Pedro II. The light enhances the attributes of the place, and attracts even more
passers-by to the pleasure of contemplation and enjoyment, uses that add meaning and therefore
lead to a sense of belonging and identification with the space. These reinforce, similarly, the

3
Cruls, asserts that "the path that led to the southern part of the city [...] must have been the oldest, since it needed, when you made
the switch from the city of Vila Velha to the Morro do Castelo ".

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ISUF 2015 XXII international Conference: City as organism. New visions for urban life

centrality of the Largo do Machado. New investments in improvement of the conditions of access
and mobility were made and triggered ripple positive effects. The first public transportation
streetcar line in the city ran along Catete street and stopped by the Largo. The Botanical Garden
Railroad Company, in 1868, started this line from the City centre to the area in question, through
Rua do Catete. The line was extended, in 1871, to the Botanical Garden and the Gávea. In 1892,
electric street cars took over and in 1976 the first metro line was built along the same route. The
recurrence of investments reinforces the economic, social, cultural and political prestige acquired.
Other initiatives followed to enhance the Largo do Machado aesthetic. In 1869, the square was
redesigned with an elaborate landscaping project by renowned French Landscaper, Glaziou.

From the original Glaziou project remain the various huge fig trees and the series of very tall palm
trees. They distinguish the Largo do Machado amid the density of the surrounding buildings and
reaffirm the prestige of both the Catete Street and the Largo. The presence of refined architecture
buildings that are home to renowned institutions still today, as in the period of the second empire
also serve the same purpose. Among these are the Portuguese Charity, the Positivist Temple, the
Palácio de São Joaquim, the Faculty of medicine, installed in the old Asylum of St. Cornelius, and
the College Amaro Cavalcante, in Largo do Machado (Lustosa, 1999, p.3). Most important of all,
on Catete Street is located the original Presidential Palace of Brazil, turned into a museum since the
Federal District function was transferred to Brasilia, in 1961. It bears the name of Palace of Catete
and with its beautiful gardens, serves the local community. The Catete Palace gardens and the
Largo, together with the housing condominium Parque Guinle, the Park of Flamengo, and two
smaller squares, Saint Salvador square and the Jose de Alencar square, define an important network
of open public places which distinguishes the neighborhood. They perform different important
complementary functions related to both traffic and mobility - Jose de Alencar and the highways
that cut across Park of Flamengo, and to a transitional scale closer to a smaller community social
and cultural practices - housing condominium Parque Guinle and Saint Salvador Square.

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ISUF 2015 XXII international Conference: City as organism. New visions for urban life

Figure 2: map of the neighborhood of Catete, Flamengo and Botafogo with the network of public open spaces
highlighted.
…………………………….

Conclusion: Preliminary findings of a survey in progress

In the light of the methodological procedure adopted in this study of "organic evolutionary
landscape", some preliminary results emerge. The perceived individual spatial cumulative
appropriations of public spaces reveal various imaginary projections and desires. These seem to
reflect the “carioca utopia” in everyday life as a criterion of choice and space appropriation of the
city of Rio de Janeiro. Fruition, stimulated by attractive singularities, helps enormously to build
meaningful places, leading to its preservation as tradition. Recognition as tradition in turn also
constitutes a singularity attractive to more uses and fruition.

The continued fruition appears to generate everyday appropriations that establish a sense of
affection. These appropriations are, thus, in forms of territorialization that although appear single,
do not cease to be shared. The identification with the city's public spaces is therefore the
identification of values on the other. The enjoyment of public space is also the enjoyment of the
audience that frequents it. The identification with public spaces recognized as representative of a
traditional city, passes through the recognition of the other and is also a form of identification with
the city itself.

Successive actions of public authorities, reaffirm the Catete axis and the Largo do Machado as
attractive singularities of Rio de Janeiro that feed the intensification of this attractiveness. Access to
public transportation, artistic presentations, the rest in the range of work, contemplation of the
landscape and the other, the crossing for work or recreation, ensure wide participation in the life of
the city. This shows various stages of joint enjoyment at the same time they are setting new
attractions, contributing to the consolidation of a tradition to their work.

Indicative of public recognition, literary works, such as the chronic "Battle at the Largo do
Machado" by Rubem Braga (1935), describes "a deep samba orfeônico to the large masses", in
which "everyone advances beating drums". Circling around the square, advancing down the street
of Catete, Largo do Machado carnival "blocos" still bring together thousands of revelers, cariocas
and tourists, in their paths. Another sign of the vitality of the forces is the presence of street theater.
From the initiative of Professor Turle Licko on "theatre of the oppressed", at UNIRIO-Urca, a
group of theater students and people interested in the subject proposed to hold meetings in public
spaces from Rio de Janeiro to discuss Street Theater, appropriation of public space and
privatization.

This consists of a sort of 'coffee in the square', a participatory spectacle, constructing a scene, with a
screenplay and viewer, which can intervene and participate directly in the debate. Asked about the
choice of Largo do Machado as a stage for the first encounter, Turle explains that "at the moment
the Largo do Machado is a place where everything happens". The answer confirms the underlying
hypothesis of the method adopted of the cyclic behavior of the “organic or spontaneous”
configuration process here analyzed.
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ISUF 2015 XXII international Conference: City as organism. New visions for urban life

The justification confirms the hypothesis that this work, regarding the consolidation of a tradition to
their work, in General conceptions regarding the Broad Axe, from attractive and singularities of the
joint space, fruition as identified of the application of the methodology adopted here.

Figure 3: the "theatre of the oppressed" in the square, appropriation-spectacle that encourages interaction with the
public and with the public space. Photo: Lamounier, 09/2013

This sense of appreciation as tradition renews meanings and ensures, in a cyclical process, more
attractiveness. Its consolidation relates to a sense of recognition, familiarity, which depends on this
everyday construction. The continued experience is more propitious to the establishment of links
with a particular space that recognition from large tax strategies for the dissemination of a desired
image. The analysis of spatial appropriations of the studied area reveals the cyclical character of the
sedimentation phases, as defined by the methodological procedure here adopted. The method also
proved useful to acknowledge the “carioca way of life tradition” that Largo do Machado and Catete
Street helped to build.

…………………

References (max. 500 words)

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Carvalho (Santos), T.C. e Coelho, C.D. (2009) O capital genético das redes de espaços públicos, in Ordem, Desordem
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Ginzburg, C. (2007) O fio e os rastros. São Paulo: Companhia das Letras.

Rome, September, 22nd-26th 2015, Faculty of Architecture, “Sapienza” University of Rome, Italy
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ISUF 2015 XXII international Conference: City as organism. New visions for urban life

Haddad, A. (2015) Valores do Sonho e da Memória. In: Teixeira, C. A. (org.) e Teobaldo, D. (ed.). Roda dos Saberes
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PM RIO – Prefeitura Municipal do Rio de Janeiro. Área de Proteção do Ambiente Cultural – APAC – Catete. Rio de
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Acesso em maio de 2015.

UNESCO – ORGANIZAÇÃO DAS NAÇÕES UNIDAS PARA A EDUCAÇÃO, A CIÊNCIA E A CULTURA. Com o
Rio, Brasil passa a ter 19 sítios na Lista do Patrimônio Mundial da UNESCO. Representação da UNESCO no Brasil.
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view/news/rio_becomes_the_19th_brazilian_site_in_the_world_heritage_list_of_unesco/>. Acesso em 15/09/2012.

Captions: (insert max 4 images JPEG 300 dpi as separate files)

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