Social production of the public space from street art in Manizales, Colombia

Abstract

Street art is an artistic expression that allows understanding the urban from other dimensions and establishes its own languages, as alternative ways of communication in the city. This article explores categories of street art to analyze its practices and uses, in relation to the social production of public space in Manizales. Since 2012, these expressions have brought about changes that envision new social relations and practices. This article is based on qualitative research of interpretative order from the experience of the city, documentary review, observation and interviews. To establish an understanding of the phenomenon from its forms, ways and places where they appear, a geographic information system (GIS) was used to group the aesthetic expressions into categories of analysis: 1) By artists involved; 2) By type of aesthetic expression; and 3) By relationship with the environment. These manifestations are understood as urban narratives and new ways of inhabiting the territory. Although it is a collective bet exercised by a part of the population, their practices put in crisis the everyday of a society accustomed to invisibilize the difference and to make otherness a synonym of the rejectable, censurable and reproachable.

Keywords:
City; perception; street art; artistic expression; public space.