BijaRi

For over a decade, the BijaRi Group has fused art and activism in the urban enclaves of São Paulo, Brazil. Through artistic strategies ranging from video art and large-scale design to performance and installation, members Eduardo Fernandes, Geandre Tomazone, Gustavo Godoy, Maurício Brandão, Olavo Ekman, and Rodrigo Araújo infuse art into everyday life. In their seminal Chicken Performance (2002), members of the group released a chicken inside two of São Paulo’s busiest shopping centers: the Larga de Batata mall, used by the city’s most impoverished citizens, and the Iguatemí, frequented by São Paulo’s richest clientele. BijaRi filmed the resulting reactions, thereby exposing the discrepancies in behavioral patterns between socioeconomic groups. It is this “pretended normality” that BijaRi works to confront and disrupt. More recently, BijaRi has been exploring the impact of globalization and gentrification on their native São Paulo, furthering their investigation into contemporary urban issues. In addition to their interventions in urban space, the group’s work includes video and web design as well as commissioned projects for advertising and government agencies.

Founded in 1996 in São Paulo, Brazil