WP337 Arts-activist literacies across a lifespan: An ethnographic biography of Ítala Isis and the (in)Visible Cities Movement in Rio de Janeiro

This article presents an approach to biographical writing developed through ethnographic fieldwork on social movement literacies in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. From that wider range, the focus is on arts-activist literacies across the lifespan of one person and a small-scale arts movement that she founded: Ítala Isis (1977-) and the (in)Visible Cities Movement (2009-2015). Multiple forms, roles, and meanings of inscription in art and activism are documented, both in situ as a part of repertoires of aesthetic-political actions, as well as over time through semiotic trajectories and life courses. The period of the (in)Visible Cities Movement coincided with a historic but highly contentious moment in Rio de Janeiro. From the late-2000s to mid-2010s, Rio was undergoing intense social changes. These included the rise and fall of an economic boom cycle, controversial new urban planning, the recent popularization of Web 2.0 communications, as well as reinvigorated social movements and protests. Residents in several areas of the city, especially Rio’s favelas, were impacted on and reacted against a model of gentrification and (in)securitization including coerced population displacements, and expansions across the city of militarized policing in its support. Recalling this period from early twenty-first century Brazil, the account contributes empirical and personal details to interdisciplinary investigations of capitalist (re)orderings of urban space, as well as situated forms of resistance. The particular approach combines ethnographic and biographical perspectives on literacy, art, and activism.