An argument today from SEBS for the power of politically charged Street Art in the suburbs of Lisbon. He shares with us his new adaptation of a previous project on child labor called “Slaves ‘R’ Us.” This one is a consciousness raising campaign he’s calling “Headvertising”

The mindless obeyance required by consumer advertising messages and PR firms that push disinformation has left the suburban landscape a disjointed, deactivated communities. We would argue it is about an eroding sense of responsibility toward preserving local culture, the pod-based life of traveling from location to location in automobiles, the lack of communal public spaces, and the seductive power of electronic media that demands us to sit passively and be entertained to death.

In our cities, the vox populi is alive and well on the streets, and our Street Art reflects it with textural and visual critiques of politics, policy and culture. But SEBS (Mauro Carmelino) says that he’s creating and advertising for fictional products to encourage us to “use our heads” and think about the great problems of modern societies, such as consumerism, pollution or the misinformation. He talks about these humorous hand-painted pieces he’s been putting up to help people re-connect, and he tells us about the disconnection between the suburbs and the city and how he feels about populations whom he wants to reach.

“The geographical gap between the city and the suburbs is accentuated in the degree of information and even in education, particularly in older age groups and in the most economically fragile communities. This remoteness has a negative impact on the ability of suburban populations to be part of discussions that can lead to the decisions that alter the social fabric, which, like in a vicious cycle, aggravates their remoteness – turning it into a kind of endemic exclusion.” To tell the truth, this isolation happens everywhere.

Today’s images come from the neighborhood of Reboleira, Damaia and 6 de Maio in Amadora city in the northwest of the Lisbon metropolitan area.

“These works are meant to be of satirical or subversive nature,” SEBS says, “with a light and sometimes even humorous approach. Advertising that usually sells products, brands and dreams of consumption is used to sell us structural social problems. I want the audience to turn from a passive consumption of reality to develop the critical thinking the world so badly needs to change.”

Here his message is conveyed through mass culture vernacular influenced by cartoons – the medium is brush and aerosol.

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