September 20th, 2006
Sao Paulo mayor moves to ban billboards
By Spacing // 2 Comments
Cross-posted to Spacing Votes -- by David Scrivener
While doing my evening news round-up I came across an interesting article on the BBC's website about a brash move by the mayor of Brazil's largest city.
Mr Kassab [Sao Paulo's mayor] has submitted a bill to the Sao Paulo city council that would completely change the urban environment, prohibiting practically all outdoor ads in their present form. "I know the bill is radical, but it's emblematic," he says. "It's controversial, but necessary for the city."
Ordinary Paulistanos are not too keen, fearing that the city's grey concrete would look even greyer without the generous splashes of colour provided by advertising.
"It would be like New York without Times Square," said one. "No, it would be like eastern Europe before the fall of communism," said another.
Others have dismissed the initiative as a publicity stunt by Mr Kassab, but Brazil's advertising agencies are worried.
The remainder of the article can be found here. It goes on to describe billboard advertising as evidence of a strong Brazilian middle class. It is also over running every surface in the city, as well as a bastion of racism towards the country's sizable Afro-Brazilian population with its few black models. Doesn't sound too different from some common complaints towards Canadian advertisers.
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Neither the author nor Spacing necessarily agree with the comments posted below. Spacing reserves the right to edit or delete comments entirely. See our Comment Policy.
Most of the arguments made by advertisers/economists were silly. Urban life will decay? There would be no life in New York without Times Square? That's crazy talk. As if all New Yorkers hang out in Times Square. As if Sao Paulo has nothing other to offer life than ads!
I didn't know there were complaints in Canada about ethnic groups not being fairly represented in advertising.
I like huge billboards and I find them to be very iconic of life in a big city. It's really the little, guerilla advertising campaigns like spraypainting on the street or driving around in trucks with rotating ad columns that's more offensive.
What's really exciting is when different layers of a wall's paint start peeling and different eras are exposed in a city's urban landscape. It's really exciting to look up to the top of an old warehouse and see an ad for pianos dating back to 1896.
Comment by leonard
September 21, 2006 | 9:19 am