Flyer, Macquinho ON “One Love”, June 9, 2017.

Macquinho ON: A Platform for Voice and Chance

Elielton Rocha Telto

Art culture planted in the favela that makes access sensitive and sensibility accessible.

Brief history

The Miguel Coelho Module of Community Action, inaugurated in December 2008, is located at the top of the community known as Morro do Palácio [Palace Hill] in Niterói. [T.N Morro = hill in Portuguese and in common parlance also connotes favela]. Geographically dialoguing with the Museum of Contemporary Art of Niterói (MAC) below both buildings face each other. They also both bear the sinuous and unmistakable signature of the genius Oscar Niemeyer. The Module, due to its geographical and affective proximity to MAC, was called the Macquinho [T.N. Mac = MAC (the museum) and “inho = little hence “Little Mac”] to house the project Arte Ação Ambiental [Art Environmental Action]. This project was born in 1999, responding to the museum’s interest in expanding its territory of dialogues within the city of Niterói. The project also was in tune with the new museological concepts of the time period, focusing on creating a museum that interacts with its public and its surroundings. And nothing better than to start with its neighboring favela community. Arte Ação Ambiental worked with 50 young people from the Morro do Palácio offering creative workshops that dealt with socio-environmental citizenship and artistic practices. This initiative culminated in the construction of Macquinho with investments from the BNDES [National Brazilian Social Bank] and Niterói’s municipal government.

A stool, a guitar and a recording studio moves outside

On a Friday afternoon in 2012, some employees of the Macquinho team decided to bring out a few stools, a guitar, speakers, and a microphone and set up a kind of pop-up show in front of the building. It was the musician Cristiano Oliveira, at the time admin staff at Macquinho and MAC cultural producer, who decided to show all his talent playing and interacting with the public. In 2014, Macquinho no longer only housed the Arte Ação Ambiental project and became the first Digital Urban Platform of the city of Niterói, bringing a new perspective of social empowerment and socio-digital inclusion. Now, with a semi-professional recording studio, Macquinho began to receive bands and artists of diverse musical genres to record,  rehearse or explore moments of immersion and experiment with laboratories of audio-visual experiences. A studio with this power and having so much to say could not be restricted to four walls, and with the idea to highlight what was, in fact, the ordinary daily routine of the studio, DJ William Moreira, studio coordinator and co-coordinator of art, culture and citizenship, Elielton Rocha, along with the Macquinho team created “Macquinho ON” or “open mic” Macquinho.

Why a Platform for Voice and Chance?

Macquinho ON is a resident project of Macquinho that provides “mics” and a platform for independent artists and bands to show their skills. The encounter/event takes place once a month, usually on the 1st Friday. With the participation of the resident band “Peace in the World”, Macquinho ON welcomes different musical guests at each event which is held outside, in front of the building  overlooking MAC and Guanabara Bay.

The project helps to weave networks of cultural organizations and provides opportunities in which those involved can present their work and their art, promoting the involvement and dissemination of these artists independently. The project, with this new format, began in 2016, and has already counted on the participation of more than 15 artists, from diverse musical genres, ranging from rap to the traditional Guanabara Orchestra. The Macquinho ON project has also already participated in major events held in the city of Niterói, such as the National Science and Technology Week.

Participants usually present themselves in an organized manner, established according to the order of arrival. The time of presentation varies and is not pre-determined. The equipment used in the presentations is provided by employees of the Macquinho studio. The event is promoted independently, without financial support, via the presenting musicians and friends of the project. The project plays an important role in the music scene in Niterói, creating performance opportunities, promoting the artists and the music studio, which is free and open to all.

Voice and Chance for what?

Macquinho ON aims to promote a space of cultural interaction, diversity of musical genres, and enable the dissemination of independent artists, Macquinho and the studio of Macquinho. In this way, it both provides cultural and leisure opportunities for the community and visitors. We hope to continue the activities of Macquinho ON, expanding and improving its outreach, securing more production help including everything from cleaning the premises and maintenance of sound equipment to publicizing the events.

The Song that Describes Us

The following song describes the project and its history well which we understand as “responsible improvisation, “a territory that hosts poetic experiences where we can exchange and musicalize all the time. The lyrics are mine (Elieton Rocha or “Telto”) arranged by DJ William Moreira. A music video follows.

A Future Rap
Lyrics: Elielton Rocha (Telto)
Arrangements and beat: DJ William Moreira

What’s up? Get off the wall. Hi Future, say hi to your Future!
1998 genial idea,
Two-way street museum,
social Niemeyer,
youth permeating new cultural space.
Macquinho in the Palace [Favela], Art Environmental Action.
Architect designed a special project
Today we are a Digital Urban Platform
Working for the common good in various areas,
socio-digital inclusion for empowerment.
Favela lives and cries out once a month.
The event “Macquinho On” gives voice and chance.
Publics in the plural give their message to society
Making access accessible and sensible to accessibility
Forever! Because our time has come
Remix of ideas,
all together at the same time
A Niemeyer in the favela is a touristic blessing
Talented bands
opportunities,
artist residencies
Sound that shakes beyond four walls,
effective connection,
affective,
making networks
Provide the space for conviviality,
technology, languages and experiences.
Fusion of supports adaptable to the flow of things
From the digital to the analogue in the same experience.

                                              ***

The world is an octopus that embraces you with several tentacles.
Open the mind, bring up the curtain, it is show time,
Original is what creates, everything is copied,
These are innovations that go beyond technology.
Improve performance, upgrade at a high level,
Evidence of what was once almost invisible
Keyboard, guitar, drum improving quality,
I go down, embrace the embrace needed to embrace the city.
Musicalize, go for it, sonorize
new ways to create, compose, sing.
Festival of bands, culmination of excellence
Musical theory, growth in evidence
Find your space in the market, make an insertion,
For many to gain their bread, interaction or socialization
t’s time to make history, the soundtrack.
Macquinho On, Macquinho On
Wherever you are, wherever I go,
Higher flight, art takes me just to find you
if it’s to be to charm you
In any elegant rhyme and
Immersed,
from the physical to the virtual and vice versa
There is no barrier between art and life,
Between us and the world,
The future is the starting point
Trust me!
“Hi, Future!” and it will not be for nothing.
Let’s potentialize connections that drive people!

 

***

 

Elielton Rocha
“Telto” (1984) teaches early childhood education in a community crèche and is also an art educator, poet and co-coordinator of art, culture and citizenship at Niterói’s Macquinho Digital Urban Platform where he coordinates various socio-cultural actions.
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1 [E.N] The third part of the video Care as method in this edition includes interviews with “Telto” and William Moreira, studio coordinator and features a subtitled version of the song “Rap of the Future”: http://institutomesa.org/revistamesa/edicoes/5/portfolio/cuidado-como-metodo-en/?lang=en