Reclaiming democratic (public) spaces through music. The case of Viaduto Santa Tereza in Belo Horizonte, Brazil

This chapter explores how cultural and artistic interventions in urban space can shape collective identities and create momentum for the political activism of social movements. It shows how music and sound operate in (re)creating space and place-making, not only as a dissenting voice in the urban landscape, but also by producing momentum for political activism, which is obtained together through contestation and the proposal of alternative ways of (re)creating new spaces. H. Lefebvre talks about homogeneous, planned, abstract space as counterposed to lived and relational space, where identities are born, also from alterity, throughout territoriality. Public spaces in particular are considered marginal by the municipality and therefore represent the smallest amount of the space developed. The appropriation of the space under the viaduct serves to restructure public space and democratic agonism, redefining and renegotiating a shared living space within the city.