São Paulo’s pixação and street art: representations of or responses to Brazilian modernism?

In the first half of the twentieth century, Brazil aimed to couple political inde - pendence with cultural emancipation. The quest to define a national identity that was autonomous would serve as the basis of a new national project built on the premise of modernity. The formation of national identity was parallel to a modernist aesthetic – one that informed the growth of creative cities and Brazilian artistic production. While architecture and the arts once served to build a modern national identity, the chapter looks at how contemporary street art may be read as continuation or response to the modernist project. Pixação, São Paulo’s unique style of tagging is presented as a possible dystopian representation, one that illustrates the shortcomings of modernism.