Opinion: Touro de Ouro is not what downtown São Paulo needs

by

Less than ten days after its placement, the B3’s “Golden Bull” ended up being removed from its post at Rua 15 de Novembro, in the center of São Paulo.

The big golden animal stayed on the street long enough to be the target of protest, become a meme and appear in the newspaper almost every day since its installation. It ended up fulfilling the role of a successful marketing action, regardless of whether that was the original intent.

For Guilherme Benchimol, founder of XP, the removal was “one of the biggest absurdities” he’s ever seen. “The sadness is even greater because the center of SP needed something that could attract people to revive local commerce and revive the economy,” he also wrote.

With good intentions, the bull is surrounded.

According to its creator, artist and architect Rafael Brancatelli, the purpose of the work was to encourage tourism.

For Pablo Spyer, partner at XP and presenter of the program Minuto Touro de Ouro, who funded the play, the idea was to promote financial education and the importance of investments.

Finally, B3 stated in a note that the sculpture “honorifies the strength and courage of Brazilians, in addition to being a gift to the city of São Paulo, aiming at revitalizing the city’s historic center.”

The very notion of revitalization is questionable from the point of view of urban planners like Regina Prosperi Meyer.

Professor at the Faculty of Architecture and Urbanism at USP, with a long trajectory of thinking about the central region of the city, Meyer fights the term, which she sees as prejudiced because, as she has stated on different occasions, the center is full of life, precisely because of its plurality. .

If the region has become a residual space, she argues, it is because the dispossessed have appropriated the gap left by the departure of companies from the central area.

For Meyer, it is more appropriate to speak of requalification. Making use of the center at different times, with varied activities that take into account the diversity of people who occupy it, is one of the paths towards this requalification.

We all know that commercial activity, as Benchimol reminds us, was fatally wounded in the pandemic. In the case of popular street commerce, as is the case in the center, the damage is presumably greater, depending on the passage of people.

A gilded statue, which evokes a symbol of New York —mecca and goal of many people from São Paulo— certainly attracts the attention of passersby. But it is almost certain that any unstampable novelty would.

However, if investors like Benchimol or Spyer are willing, they can act more lastingly to requalify the center.

XP could have a headquarters in the vicinity of B3 — interestingly, motivated by the benefits of the home office, announced in the pandemic a new headquarters in the interior of the state.

They could also form funds for the maintenance of assets that have been listed or not, or invest directly in traditional businesses that have been affected by the crisis.

Surely, they could put their name in these places as supporters without facing problems with the Clean City Law. Art for art, the center is full of it, just knowing how to look. There are guided tours that could also be adopted by brands.

Why not an XP Tourinho Tour, showing not only the church in Largo de São Bento, right next door, with purchases at the monks’ bakery and café in Girondino, but also passing by the Igreja das Chagas do Serafico Pai São Francisco, whose the façade is the work of the enslaved craftsman Joaquim Pinto de Oliveira Tebas (1721-1811)?

On the way between them, you can eat one of the best patties in the city, at Casa Godinho, and go up to the terrace of the beautiful Martinelli, the city’s first skyscraper.

Less shiny actions, but more perennial, require planning, mobilization and continuous investment. They take more work, cost more, and require robust courage — taurine, you might say.

.

You May Also Like

Recommended for you