Reconstructed view
March 15–June 22, 2020
São Paulo, Brazil
These photographs chronicle the traces of humans and non-humans visible from the window of a modernist apartment building in São Paulo during the Covid-19 pandemic. Taken at different times over a period of four months, these sequences reconstruct and reframe the ordinary view, presenting it as a collection of everyday scenes in fragments.
Unlike in European cities, where buildings are mostly close together, in some areas of São Paulo neighbours cannot easily communicate with each other via verandas or shared courtyards. For this reason, most of the images were captured using a camera adapted to a pair of binoculars, a homemade invention.
These micro-stories address some important issues related to discussions of race, gender, and class. During the pandemic, who has the privilege of staying at home?
The resulting images highlight this tension: black women cleaning windows, busy maintenance and construction workers on site, and Uber delivery bicycles carrying packages alongside yoga practitioners, sunbathers, and people working from home.
