Salvador Grafita Artists at AOSR

Yesterday morning, when Pietro and the three Brazilians entered the school gates, it was like a homecoming. With its Bridge to Bahia project now in its second year, The American Overseas School has built a thick web of friendships with people from the ICBIE and the city of Salvador. Three AOSR teachers have worked at the ICBIE (and another, Louise Audette, will go this summer), two fresh graduates have done volunteer work (including one who is still there), an entire family spent their Christmas holidays there, and of course, I am both an AOSR music teacher and a co-founder of the ICBIE.

Yesterday’s appointment was both the last stop of the Salvador grafita European tour and the first day of Pietro’s seven week stay, save several trips in the interim. The two famous Bahian artists, Pinel and Lee 27, the photographer José Francisco Paranaguá Guimarães and Pietro spent four hours with us, while the painters did their work, with classes of students passing by to watch them in action. After months of seeing the beautiful murals painted by Julio and Bigode on the first grafita tour last October, our students are expert connoisseurs of Bahian street art. (Their work is still there on the wall, but in the spring we show our own student artworks, so they are temporarily covered.) Unfortunately, this time the weather, which cursed this entire two week long excursion through France, Germany, Spain and Italy, was again dreadfully rainy and raw, but spirits remained high, thanks to the steady stream of warm reunions. Daniele Dattilo and I hadn’t seen Pietro since leaving Ribeira last August, and while our prize student Gabriele was there less than four months ago, his mom drove across the city to come and have lunch with us.

Having the Brazilians face to face again brings the Bridge to Bahia mission to its highest goal, and the memories of their smiling faces will be a great boost for our spring fund raising campaign.