Ambiguous presence

an investigation into the marks and traces in the territory of Parque Dom Pedro II

Abstract

This article has the objective to analyze the territory of Parque Dom Pedro II, in São Paulo, discussing how investigations in the urban space can reveal contents that are not immediately visibly noticed unless you pay proper attention to it. Thus, with a closer look, we can reveal processes and strategies for marking and erasing traces that characterize the domain of territories. Perception occurs through the body – a sensitive organ – that experiences the public space. The space for collective coexistence is composed of traces and marks of different social actors that constitute it. The ambiguous presence that we perceive in the contemporary metropolis is what this work is about. Thus, to discuss such issues, the work is organized in three parts: the first discusses theoretical concepts that will base the practice; the second presents a brief historical context of Parque D. Pedro II; and the third performs the perceptual analysis from the public space. We argue that the reading of the urban landscape is a construction made by the overlapping of relative and partial versions that only become whole when viewed together and with a transversal look, that is: to understand the complexity of social and spatial analyses with categories and identities that are changeable and can have different interpretations.