Sim Archives - 14ᵃ Bienal Internacional de Arquitetura de São Paulo

Film show

Cinema, architecture and society: records of a hot world

How can cities and their architectures face climate emergencies in the face of exponential tragedy, beyond construction strategies and their technicalities?

Faced with such uncertainties, cinema—and culture in general—presents itself as a fundamental tool for denunciation, raising questions that challenge everyone. But not only that. Sequenced moving images are fertile ground for imagining other futures, reinventing social dynamics, broadening the debate on consumption, and truly agreeing on a balance between humans, built space, and the environment.

The challenges are stacked up.

This film screening, aligned with the curatorial thinking of the 14th BIAsp – Extremes: Architectures for a Hot World, seeks to critically provoke the public through a selection of feature and short films, both fictional and documentary, Brazilian and non-Brazilian, framing human rights, traditional knowledge, science and experimental constructions, extraction of natural resources, preservation and climate justice as central characters.

Rafael Blas – curator/programmer

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All screenings are free. Tickets can be picked up at the Cinemateca box office one hour before screenings.

Cinematheque: Largo Sen. Raul Cardoso, 207 – Vila Clementino, São Paulo – SP, 04021-070

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SESSION 1

BREAKING

Documentary, short film, 23 minutes
Year: 2024
Country: Brazil
Directed by: Janaina Wagner
Production: Janaina Wagner

Synopsis

A counter-spell, QUEBRANTE explores the ruins of the Trans-Amazonian Highway BR-230 and its phantasmagoria, portraying its stones and its ghosts. Set in the small town of Rurópolis, Pará—the first to be built on the highway, serving as a base for its construction workers—QUEBRANTE follows Dona Erismar, known locally as "The Cave Woman." A retired elementary school teacher, Dona Erismar was responsible for discovering the region's caves: she entered the dark, unknown holes to their ends, holding only a candle and a lighter tied to her pants—in case the flame went out. A conversation between the stones and the moon, QUEBRANTE is loosely inspired by Robert Smithson's project THE TRULY UNDERGROUND CINEMA (1971) and Maya Deren's film THE VERY EYE OF THE NIGHT (1958).

IRACEMA: AN AMAZONIAN SEX

Documentary/fiction, feature film, 90 minutes
Year: 1974
Country: Brazil
Directed by: Jorge Bodanzky, Orlando Senna
Production: Stopfilm

Synopsis

In 1970, a truck driver from the South, in Belém, Pará, during the Círio de Nazaré festival, meets Iracema, a young Indigenous prostitute. He gives her a ride, dropping her off in a small village on the side of the road. The trip, like the entire film, serves as a pretext for depicting the region's problems—deforestation, poor working and health conditions, and the sale of peasants, all in conflict with fanciful institutional propaganda.

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FULL PROGRAM

September 17 | Wednesday | 5:30 PM to 7:30 PM
Session 1 | Quebrante + Iracema: an Amazonian sex

September 21 | Sunday | 5:30 PM to 7:30 PM
Session 2 | Interior of the Earth + Top

September 24th | Wednesday | 5:30pm to 7:30pm
Session 3 | Colors Burn + Sky Falls

10/1 | Wednesday | 5:30 PM to 7:30 PM
Session 4 | Heyari + Fisherman's Street No. 6

02.10 | Thursday | 5:30pm to 7:30pm
Session 5 | Cold Recife + Fisherman's Street No. 6

08.10 | Wednesday | 5:30pm to 7:30pm
Session 6 | The Institute of Weather Modification + The fall of the sky

09.10 | Thursday | 5:30pm to 7:30pm
Session 7 | The Time It Takes + The Silence of the Oysters

Associated activities

Land in weave

Indigenous communities present their ancestral territories in the first person. They narrate situations in which the LAND is intentionally placed in a WEFT. Clay interspersed with bamboo builds walls and defines spaces; geography in the warp of cartographies forms arguments and delineates boundaries; the word in the fabric of narratives engenders strategies and charts directions. The set of maps produced critically, collectively, and collaboratively brings together stories from Indigenous Territories and touches on different ethnicities, perspectives, biomes, and forms of agency experienced in the State of Paraná and its surrounding areas.

Seeking an alternative to colonial documentation experiences, which over the centuries have forged—and continue to forge—an exoticized and anachronistic original universe, TERRA EM TRAMA attempts specific self-representation in addressing one of the crucial themes of the Indigenous struggle: disputed territories. They are described with academic precision and annotated with ancestral precision, constituting cartographic self-portraits. The maps discuss the presence and relationships between Communities and their Territories, implementing procedures from Indigenous oral and material traditions of layering, inventive exploitation, and diversity of expressions.
The annotated panels are supported by an exhibition structure that, similarly, takes shape from interaction with the traditional knowledge of indigenous builders, supporting the transmission of diverse knowledge through construction practice. It conveys the argument that exhibition structures, open spaces, buildings, cities, and forests are fundamentally political and crucial tools for postponing the ends of so many worlds.

Estúdio Fronteira (Frontier Studio) – a university outreach project coordinated by architect and professor Marina Oba within the Department of Architecture and Urbanism at UFPR. Its objective is to develop records and guidelines that engage with non-hegemonic modes of spatial production. It encompasses the development of technical surveys and diagnoses of architectural complexes and urban and rural landscapes, with an emphasis on human appropriations and manifestations, as well as the development of guidelines for management and territorial structuring.

+Resumption of Kaingang de Kógunh Jãmã, Parque do Mate (Campo Largo), Resumption of Kaingang de Rán Krī Tupē Jamã, Christ of Purunã (São Luís do Purunã), Urban Village of Kakané Porã (Curitiba), Multiethnic Resumption of Tekoa Ywy Dju, Sacred Territory (Piraquara), Tekoa Kuaray Haxá (Antonina), Tekoa Tupã Nhe'e Kretã (Morretes), Tekoa Kuaray Guatá Porã, Cerco Grande Indigenous Land (Guaraqueçaba), Tekoa Pindoty and Tekoa Takuaty, Ilha da Cotinga Indigenous Land (Paranaguá), Rio d'Areia Indigenous Land (Inácio Martins), + independent collaborations.

This project is sponsored by Copel, through the State Program for the Promotion and Incentive of Culture | PROFICE of the State Secretariat for Culture | Government of the State of Paraná.

The activity will begin at 8 am and will end after the structure closes, scheduled for 4 pm.
It is possible to participate in the activity at any time during its development.

Location of activity

Museum of Indigenous Cultures, Rua Dona Germaine Burchard, 451 – Água Branca, São Paulo

Registration

It is not necessary to register to participate in the activity.

To receive a certificate of participation it is necessary fill out the form until September 12th (8 hours of training activities, by UFPR).

Workshops

Imagining Architectures for a Warming World

“Imagining Architectures for a Warming World” is a 20-hour hands-on workshop that invites participants to explore the speculative potential of artificial intelligence applied to urban imagination in times of climate emergency. Using ComfyUI (Stable Diffusion) software, participants will learn to manipulate urban images to design visual interventions that critically respond to scenarios of risk, injustice, and collapse, but also imagine sustainable, regenerative, and desirable futures.

The workshop seeks to broaden participants' imaginative range by proposing the creation of both utopian and dystopian visual compositions, articulating visual narratives that critically and creatively reflect on the climate crisis. AI is understood here as a tool for aesthetic and political mediation, capable of challenging the relationship between representation and action in the urban context.

Divided into five modules—introduction, two production sessions, finalization, and exhibition—the workshop combines theory, practice, and collective creation. The final product will be a public exhibition at the Biennial, composed of projected images. The proposal aligns with the curatorial axes of the 14th BIAsp by addressing climate justice, urban adaptation, and symbolic reforestation of cities.

Open to students, architects, urban planners, artists, and other interested parties, the activity will have up to 20 participants, selected based on a letter of intent and portfolio. Each participant must bring their own laptop capable of running ComfyUI or using a cloud service (such as RunPod). The workshop will provide installation tutorials and prior guidance. The Biennial will provide internet infrastructure, tables, chairs, and a projector.

The workshop is free, subject to registration and selection process.

The final product will be a collective installation open to the public in the Biennial space.

Vacancies: 10

Free

About the proponents:

Victor Sardenberg is an architect and researcher focused on experimentation in architectural design, particularly in the areas of computational aesthetics, robotic fabrication, and artificial intelligence. In his doctoral thesis at Leibniz University Hannover (Germany), he developed a computational framework for predicting aesthetic preferences using artificial neural networks. He is currently a postdoctoral researcher at Mackenzie Presbyterian University and a professor at Detmolder Schule für Gestaltung (Germany).

Camila Zyngier is an architect and urban planner, professor at UFMG, and researcher in the areas of urban planning, geotechnologies, and participatory methodologies. Her work combines academic practice and creative criticism, exploring topics such as urban visualization and artificial intelligence in urban planning.

Marcella Carone is an architect, computational designer, and professor. With a Master's degree from AA (MSc EmTech) and a bachelor's degree from Mackenzie University, she has over a decade of experience in multi-scale projects. She works with feasibility, algorithmic design, AI, optimization, and digital fabrication. She is the creative director of M3C1, a firm that investigates the intersections of architecture, urbanism, design, and technology. She teaches in the graduate program at Mackenzie University, in addition to leading workshops on AI and computational design.

Structure

Module 1: Introduction and Contextualization (9/15 – 7:30 pm to 10:00 pm – Online) Presentation of the 14th BIAsp and its theme Examples of images and interventions with AI Installation and introduction to ComfyUI

Module 2: Production I – Desirable Interventions (September 19 – 2:00 PM to 7:00 PM – In-person) Representing climate risks and injustices (dystopias, collapses, resistance)

Module 3: Production II – Warning Scenarios (September 20th – 2:00 PM to 7:00 PM – In-person) Reimagining the city with a focus on positive solutions (climate utopias)

Module 4: Finalizing Images and Printing (9/21 – 2:00 PM to 7:00 PM – In-person) Curating the images produced Preparing files for printing/exhibition

Module 5: Exhibition of Results: Collective installation at BIAsp (projection and/or printing). Open discussion with the audience and participants. Organization of the Final Product: display of the generated images, printed or projected on the wall. The workshop concludes with an exhibition open to the public.

Registration:

Registrations must be made by email: vsardenberg@gmail.com

Selection will be made after analysis of the material sent in the application.

Documents to be submitted upon registration:

Full name

Contact email and phone number

City of residence

Letter of intent (approximately 3 paragraphs)

Up to 3 images of previous work that help demonstrate the candidate's creative and/or technical profile (can be included in the PDF or sent separately)

Selection criteria:

Participants will be selected based on the letter of intent and work examples submitted, considering:

Clarity and depth of interest in the workshop topic

Quality and coherence of the images presented

Diversity of profiles and areas of activity among those selected

Deadline for registration:

Registration will be open until September 13, 2025.

The result will be announced by email by September 14, 2025.

Other information:

Participants must bring their own laptops capable of running ComfyUI, or bring a simpler laptop and pay for the use of a cloud service (such as RunPod, approx. 10 USD).

A tutorial with installation and preparation instructions will be sent in advance to those selected.

Involvements

Acting Post-Disaster

The Envolvimentos (Involvements) fostered an open dialogue with social movements and diverse territories, converging on the exhibition of the 14th São Paulo International Architecture Biennial, which runs from September 18 to October 19 at OCA in Ibirapuera Park. Architects and leaders from villages, terreiros, riverside communities, and peripheral neighborhoods jointly explored architectures for inhabiting a heated world in debates that deepened the exhibition's central ideas.

Participants involved in projects across diverse territories and contexts addressing issues such as coexistence with water and floods, heritage preservation, forest protection and sustainable management, urban agriculture, mechanisms for enabling low-impact lifestyles, and the recognition of nature as a subject of rights were invited to participate in the dialogue. These are ways of inhabiting, building, perceiving, participating in, and transforming the territory.

4th Involvement – Acting post-disaster

The fourth gathering examines the preservation of memory and cultural heritage in post-disaster contexts, while honoring spiritual dimensions of recovery. It critically reflects on how human interventions both generate catastrophes and intensify systemic inequalities.

Guests:

Comunal
Cidade do México, Mexico

Founded by Mariana Ordóñez Grajales and Jesica Amescua Carrera, Comunal envisions architecture as a collaborative social process – living, open, and constantly evolving – with residents at the heart of decision-making. In communities affected by earthquakes, hurricanes, and floods, the studio has facilitated and guided social reconstruction processes, rebuilding not only homes but also local productive systems and community ties.

Ewesh Yawalapiti Waura
Associação Terra Indígena Xingu
Território Indígena do Xingu, MT, Brazil

Lawyer graduated from UFMT (Federal University of Mato Grosso) and Executive Director of the Associação Terra Indígena Xingu (ATIX). ATIX works to defend indigenous rights, protect territories, and promote the traditional cultures of the Xingu region. Ewésh, alongside the Waujá people, has been actively involved in protecting Kamukuwaká Cave—a sacred site for the Upper Xingu peoples and a heritage site recognized by Iphan (Institute of National Historical and Artistic Heritage). The cave suffered vandalism, and a replica was later installed within the Ulupuwene Village.

Luis Octavio de Faria e Silva
Frente Ilê Odé Ibualamo
Sao Paulo, SP, Brazil

Assistant Professor of Architecture and Urbanism at São Judas Tadeu University and researcher at Instituto Anima, with a PhD and Master’s degree from FAUUSP (University of São Paulo’s Faculty of Architecture and Urbanism). His work focuses on urbanism, housing, and ecological architecture. In 2022, he publicly denounced the demolition of the Ilê Asé Odé Ibualamo Candomblé terreiro in Carapicuíba (SP), carried out without community consultation as part of the Cadaval Stream canalization project.

Involvements

Adapt

3rd Involvement – Adapt

The third meeting discusses the use of biomaterials and waste to strengthen local autonomy and knowledge. It also addresses community training and the influence of rural and urban contexts on construction practices.

Guests:

Leticia Grappi
Salvador, BA, Brazil

Architect graduated from UFBA (Federal University of Bahia), she focuses on low-environmental-impact projects and construction. As lead architect, she designed and built a school and library in the João Amazonas Settlement in Ilhéus, Bahia. She served on the organizing committee of the TerraBrasil 2024 Congress, was a board member of the Rede TerraBrasil (2022-2024), technical reviewer for Gernot Minke's "Manual de Construção com Terra", co-creator of mapadaterra.org, and founder of the Mulheres na Bioconstrução group.

Ruína Arquitetura
Sao Paulo, SP, Brazil

Ruína Arquitetura is an award-winning studio based in São Paulo, Brazil, which has distinguished itself by its focus on local context and low environmental impact. Throughout its trajectory, it has developed architectural projects for different scales and demands, as well as research laboratories and educational activities focused on the reuse of construction materials and waste. In 2024, the office closed its activities, giving rise to two independent initiatives: Anonima Arquitetura and Julia Peres.co.

Jose Fernando Gomez
Natura Futura
Babahoyo, Ecuador

Architect graduated from the Faculty of Architecture and Urbanism at the University of Guayaquil. Founder of Natura Futura Arquitectura, a practice developing socially focused projects using local materials and techniques. Notable work includes floating structures in flood-prone areas—from community gardens to housing—bridging traditional knowledge and innovation to empower rural and marginalized communities in facing climate change.

Involvements

Mitigate

2nd Engagement – Mitigate

The second meeting focuses on mitigation and the appreciation of Indigenous ways of living, connected to local knowledge and the landscape. It also highlights the mapping of traditional knowledge and the promotion of intercultural gatherings and courses.

Casa Floresta
Sao Paulo, SP, Brazil

The Casa Floresta Association is a consulting and research center for architecture, urban planning, art and graphic design projects, which involves a network of indigenous and contemporary knowledge with the aim of strengthening traditional cultures and revitalizing territories where architecture and the forest coexist in balance. In addition to the Kamayurá Architecture Manual, Casa Floresta provided technical support for the Yudja Architecture Manual (Tuba Tuba Village – TIX, Mato Grosso) and, in partnership with the Architecture and Biosphere Platform of Escola da Cidade (SP), the Guarani Architecture Manual (TITenondé Porã).

Ana Maria Gutierrez
Fundación Organizmo
Cundinamarca, Colombia

Founder of Fundación Organizmo, an organization that fosters the exchange of knowledge and experimentation focused on social, cultural, and ecological regeneration. A pioneer in low-impact construction and alternative technologies in Colombia, she works at the intersection of education, ecological restoration, and intercultural dialogue. Her projects strengthen cultural identity, social cohesion, and the well-being of rural communities.

Sem Muros
Sao Paulo, SP, Brazil

A network of architects working to strengthen their practice through architectural and educational projects, disseminating and expanding access to social and constructive technologies that promote the recognition of available resources and their potential for creating and caring for spaces. Architecture is understood not as an object but as a process. They advocate for an architecture that is socially, environmentally, culturally, and economically integrated.

Involvements

Declare Emergency

1st Involvement – Declare Emergency

This first meeting discusses the role of architects in emergency response and disaster adaptation, both before and after events occur. It addresses living with risk, community preparedness, and interventions at urban and territorial scales.

Guests:

Joice Paixão
Associação Gris Espaço Solidário
Recife, PE, Brazil

Social scientist, researcher, social educator, conflict mediator, community therapist, Coordinator of Articulação Recife de Luta, operative of the Rede Nacional por Adaptação Antirracista, and territorial coordinator of the Rede de Governança para enfrentamento ao racismos ambiental. Co-founder and current president of the Associação Gris Espaço Solidário, which provides psychosocial support to children and families in vulnerable situations in the neighborhood of Várzea, in Recife.

Maria Alice Pereira da Silva
Morro da Pedra de Oxossi
Salvador, BA, Brazil

Lawyer, Master and PhD in Architecture and Urban Planning from UFBA (Federal University of Bahia), she is a member of the Instituto dos Advogados da Bahia and a consultant for OMPI. CEO of PX Assessoria, she works on integrating traditional knowledge and socio-environmental justice. Activist and guardian of Pedra de Xangô, she advocates for the protection of Morro da Pedra de Oxossi, a sacred site in Maraú (BA) with historical, cultural, religious, and environmental significance, currently at risk of being turned into a quarry.

Fernanda Accioly
Instituto Pólis
Sao Paulo, SP, Brazil

Architect and urban planner graduated from FAUUSP (Faculty of Architecture and Urbanism, University of São Paulo), with a master's, doctorate, and post-doctorate in Habitat and Urban and Regional Planning. She has extensive experience in municipal and federal public administration. She served as Executive Secretary of the Instituto Pólis, a civil society organization that collaborated with the local community to develop the Community Plan for Civil Defense and Climate Crisis Adaptation for the Caiçara community of Ponta Negra (RJ).

Involvements

Launch Live

Guests:

Jean Ferreira
Belém, PA

From the Jurunas neighborhood of Belém, Pará. He is a co-founder of Gueto Hub and COP das Baixadas, co-curator of public programs for the 2nd Amazon Biennial, and an activist for access to culture, memory, and the climate debate for the peripheries.

Jerá Guarani
Sao Paulo, SP

Jera Guarani, leader of the Kalipety village in the Tenonde Porã Indigenous Territory, in the far south of São Paulo. With a degree in Education, she works as an Environmental Agent, promoting the recovery of traditional seeds, degraded areas, and forests on Indigenous land.

Mother Carmen of Oxalá
Guaíba, RS

Mother Carmen de Oxalá, a Rio Grande do Sul ialorixá, is vice-president of the Rio Grande do Sul State Council of Culture and a member of the Executive Committee of the National Commission of Cultural Points (CNPDC). She is active in combating religious intolerance and holds a degree in Psychology.

Marcele Oliveira
Rio de Janeiro, RJ

Producer, communicator, and climate activist, she was a member of the Realengo 2030 Agenda and is the executive director of Perifalab. Her research focuses on climate justice and environmental racism, focusing on the occupation of public spaces and the right to the city, with a focus on culture and climate.