IN A WINDOW OF PRESTES MAIA 911 BUILDING

On the Avenida Prestes Maia, one of São Paulo's main thoroughfares, house number 911 consists of two gray apartment blocks that were once thought to be the most modern buildings in all of Latin America. The vacant high-rises were occupied in 2002 by 460 homeless families. These are the squatters Bittencourt captures in his photo series, without however forcing his way into their immediate living space. In a strict formal composition he portrays the inhabitants looking out of windows of the building. In this way he tells a story about the unconquerable longing people feel for a place they can call home, no matter how squalid and precarious. Julio Bittencourt (*1980) grew up in São Paulo and New York. His works have appeared in newspapers and magazines such as Le Monde, Stern, Aperture Magazine and LFI Magazine. He has received numerous awards, including the 2007 Leica Oskar Barnack Award.