Loures invites street artists
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On the edge of Lisbon, Quinta do Mocho was long an estate that taxi drivers refused to enter. Since 2014 the municipality of Loures has invited artists to paint its social housing blocks. By the end of 2017, 82 works covered the façades, and young residents trained as guides had shown the neighbourhood to some 6,400 visitors.
Quinta do Mocho is a rehousing estate in Sacavém, in the municipality of Loures, which borders Lisbon. Its four-storey blocks, built cheaply in the 1990s, house around 3,000 people, most of them from Portugal’s former colonies: Angola, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique, São Tomé and Príncipe. Unemployment, crime and no public transport: for years, the address alone was enough to close doors.
A mural by the Portuguese-Angolan artist Nomen tells the story: a Black woman pulling off a white mask. “To apply for work, or get into school, we often have to give a fake address,” the guide Emanuela Kalemba told about fifty visitors in November 2019, AFP reported.
The idea came from the town hall. After a first trial in 2013 on another social housing estate, Loures used European funds in 2014 to stage a festival, O Bairro i o Mundo, “the neighbourhood and the world”. Artists painted the first façades. On the first day, men from a rival estate shot two boys in the street, one guide told The Independent. The following year twice as many artists came back.
In February 2015 the municipality opened the Galeria de Arte Pública and trained seven young residents to guide visitors. The artists work unpaid; the town hall provides paint and accommodation, with help from a paint maker and a crane hire firm. By the end of 2017 the gallery had 82 works by 75 artists of 11 nationalities, including Vhils and Bordalo II. The municipal public art budget reached €100,000 in 2016 and in 2017.
According to the municipality, relations between communities have calmed down and local cafés and grocers sell a little more. A bus line now serves Quinta do Mocho. The guides remain cautious. “We won’t solve all the problems by covering the walls with paint,” Emanuela Kalemba said. In 2018 another guide described flats that are freezing in winter and put local unemployment at around 70%.
The murals can be seen from the street. Guided tours start at the Casa da Cultura de Sacavém; the municipality ran them on the last Saturday of each month, and resident guides also offer their own. One rule has stuck: no photographs of children.
By the end of 2017 the Quinta do Mocho Public Art Gallery held 82 works by 75 artists of 11 nationalities; The Independent counted 94 in August 2018. From 2015 to 2017, 152 guided tours led by young residents trained by the municipality welcomed about 6,400 people. In a questionnaire handed to participants, 98% said they wanted to come back and 99% would recommend the tour. The municipal public art budget, including the gallery, was €100,000 in 2016 and 2017, then €87,000. The estate has about 3,000 residents.
Photos: Oren Rozen, Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0: 1 2 3 5) ; r2hox, Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 2.0: 4).
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