EXHIBITION “ENERGY AND TRANSFORMATION”

ENGLISH

THE MANSION MEMORIES

How many stories can fit between the walls of a mansion? To answer this question, this room starts from the idea that all the ways in which this building has been occupied make up its heritage and, as a result, are also part of the legacy of the São Paulo Energy Museum.

So, the mansion history has been divided into four eras: Coffee Times (from 1894 to 1926), which comprises the context in which the mansion was built – when it was the residence of the family of coffee grower Henrique Santos Dumont – and the history of the planned Campos Elíseos neighborhood; of Knowledge Times, when the property housed the Stafford College (from 1927 to 1951) and was the headquarters of the Pestalozzi Society of São Paulo (from 1952 to 1982); Residence Times (from 1983 to 2001), a period when the mansion was occupied as low-income housing; and Museum Times, which comprises the entire process of restoring and resignifying the space to house the São Paulo Energy Museum (from 2001 to date).

COFFEE TIMES

This mansion bears witness to the use and changes of urban space in the Campos Elíseos neighborhood. The building was constructed between 1890 and 1894, when the neighborhood was the most sophisticated address in town. The palace was the residence of the family of Henrique Santos Dumont, brother of aviator Alberto Santos Dumont, from 1894 to 1926. The family’s wealth came from coffee production.

At the time, the money of the new coffee elite drove the acquisition of luxurious and modern items, following foreign fashions. Together with urban transformations – such as street and avenue renovations and electric lighting – they formed the pillars of São Paulo’s modernity and the attempt to erase its colonial past.

The so-called modern transformations also took place inside the building. Over the years, the building underwent a number of renovations to expand it and replace the use of gas with electricity, a process that took place in the capital, especially in the homes of São Paulo’s upper classes.

Coffee was Brazil’s main export product throughout the 19th century and into the first decades of the 20th, with production in the west of São Paulo standing out. During this period, the city of São Paulo became the “coffee metropolis” and saw an exponential increase in its population, from 30,000 inhabitants in 1872 to 500,000 in 1920.

KNOWLEDGE TIMES

In 1926, educator Blandina Ratto bought the mansion, which was then adapted and enlarged to house the Stafford School. At the time, the school offered Early Childhood Education (kindergarten, pre-primary), Primary Education I and II (primary, commercial and junior high) and Secondary Education (high school), in boarding, day and semi-boarding regimes, for female students.

The institution was considered liberal for the time, as teaching was secular, unlike schools that coexisted in the same period.

Blandina Ratto died in 1948 and the activities of Stafford College were closed in 1951, causing the students to be transferred to other educational institutions.

n view of the socioeconomic context of the country in the period, the school was aimed at wealthier families. According to data from the 1940 census, Brazilians aged ten years or older, not literate, accounted for almost 60% of the population. The highest percentage of illiteracy was among the poor, brown and black, exposing a situation of historical cultural exclusion of descendants of people who had been enslaved during Brazil Colony and Empire.

With the departure of the college, the mansion possession was transferred to the State of São Paulo Government, which assigned the use of space to the newly founded Pestalozzi Society of São Paulo (today Brazilian Association of Social Assistance and Development – ABADS).

The Society served children and teenagers with physical and intellectual disabilities, through classes called “special education”, in order to prepare students for inclusion in society and the labor market.

From the 1960s, the Pestalozzi Society of São Paulo began to face serious financial problems, including having to negotiate not to be evicted from the mansion in the following decade. As a resolution, the institution received a land in donation, where it built its new headquarters, now in the Vila Guilherme neighborhood, and which began to be occupied in 1982. From there, the mansion was idle, without a social function.

Pestalozzi hosted a boarding school and a semi-boarding school, with a painting room and a workshop for carpentry and crafts. It is worth mentioning that at the time the vision of education and training for people with disabilities was focused on the labor market and, today, it is focused on social inclusion as a whole.

RESIDENCE TIMES

The “Residence Times” tell the story of when the mansion was occupied, from the 1980s, by people who were evicted, due to processes of expropriation of tenements in the downtown São Paulo, or repossession in occupations in other regions of the city.

The occupation of the mansion, then in idle condition, without a social function, was a landmark of the beginning of this kind of organization in properties without use in downtown São Paulo. When we call this period about the history of the mansion housing the Energy Museum as “Residence Times”, we are turning our eyes to the people who lived there and made it a home, recognizing their affective relationship with the property and respecting them as protagonists of their own stories.

There are three mansion occupation movements: the first, from 1983 to 1990, the second, from 1990 to 1997, and the third, from 1997 to 2001 – year of the last repossession.

By the Federal Constitution of 1988, the social function of a property is characterized by its use in the interests of society and not only of the owners. According to the 2022 Census, the city of São Paulo has almost 12 times more empty properties than homeless people – there are almost 590 thousand empty private properties, while about 48 thousand people are estimated as living on the streets.

By the 1980s, the Champs-Elysées landscape had already changed considerably from the golden days of coffee. With the change in economic dynamics, the neighborhood ceased to stand out financially, the circulation of products and people in the region was greatly reduced, resulting in population depletion and the vacation of many properties.

The combination of empty properties in the Champs-Elysées, and the existence of transport infrastructure, services and equipment, and job and income opportunities downtown, made the region a natural location for pro-housing movements. Thus, these groups began to occupy idle buildings, claiming their transformation into popular housing.

In the hiatus between the departure of Pestalozzi and the occupation of the house by families, the space was used as an overnight stay by homeless people and drug users. The year 1983 – when families start living in the place – is considered the moment of the mansion foundation as popular housing.

The occupation consisted in the organization of people from the movements of housing and homeless, in general residents in slums in the downtown region and threatened with eviction. As usual in this type of organization, the movement of this mansion took possession of the vacant building temporarily. The focus was to negotiate with the government the participation in housing policies to ensure better housing conditions and the permanence of this population in the downtown area where, in general, they already worked.

We can consider that the first two periods of the mansion occupation for housing occurred with families coming from slums, with local organization. The third period, which began in 1997, was part of a series of coordinated, organized and continuous actions, with predefined demands for the right to housing in the downtown region, structured from the Forum of Slums and Homeless. Created in 1993, the Forum brought together groups already organized and originating in the neighborhoods of Brás, Ipiranga and Vila Formosa.

MUSEUM TIMES

In 2001, the mansion was transferred, by loan, to the Energy and Sanitation Foundation, which began the process of the space restoration and resignification.

The restoration was focused on the reconstruction of the original architectural features of the property, such as the floor, both wood and tiles, the ceiling and the paintings.

Over time, the mansion had gone through some outbreaks of fire and termite infestation. In the process, decorative paintings in the Art Nouveau style were found, which were restored and today can be seen in the museum. Prospecting windows were made so that the public could see what the original wall paintings looked like.

The São Paulo Energy Museum was inaugurated on June 7, 2005 as a space open to the community. Maintained by the Energy and Sanitation Foundation, it seeks to go beyond its scientific and historical character. It prioritizes its social function with the territory and has a number of partnerships with neighborhood agents. In addition, it hosts events of local organizations, such as those working with people in social vulnerability and the elderly.

The cultural wealth of its territory is marked by the strong presence of immigrant groups, including South Americans who work and live in the vicinity. The museum is still proud to host rehearsals and workshops of the Afro bloc Ilú Obá De Min, partner entity of the center.
“Being here and being received with this delicious energy has to do exactly with this possibility of the museum to tell the story not only of a whitewashed neighborhood, but also of being resistance.”
Donina Cibelle Rocha, member of the Block Afro Ilú Obá De Min

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