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Arts & Communication Performance arts, public space, and early childhood

enveloped by the music, surprised, and shouted at by soap know, occupying the public space once again, as we are in
bubbles, wrapped up in the codpiece tubes, and dressed in Figure 5 above.
the big toy. Sunlight progresses throughout the experience, Jorge Dubatti (2007) observes that performing art is a
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providing designs and sparkles that blend in with the convivial event that presupposes sharing an experience with
space. Dogs sit to watch the children, ladies continue their others. EmQuanta is a performative act that takes place within
stroll while observing the scene, and young people play relationships between adults and children, inhabiting the
soccer beside them. The garden is re-signified by the scenic artistic sphere together, and sharing the world in a moment
action, playing in the park is re-signified by the scenic play, of discovery. Thus, meeting the children and allowing them
and family relationships are re-signified by the experience to be freely and playfully in the space produces, as Dubatti
with the artwork. says, a poetic bodily event in conviviality.
Encountering the park is also about building a place When we can once again inhabit our bodies in a playful
where children can enjoy their freedom: to touch, walk and artistic relationship in the amplitude of a public
around, be surprised, explore, run, jump, and make- square, we begin to recognize the possibilities of living
believe. It also creates a break in the frenetic urban together, of perceiving the environment, of approaching
temporality, getting away from the noise of machines and the other without fear and then establishing a dialogue
the urban agglomeration. It is getting out of the apartments between what is happening in ourselves, with the others,
and rediscovering the open, public, and convivial space. and with the inhabited space. In this way, when performing

7. Rediscovering others and meeting the EmQuanta, we try to observe how the children’s bodies
are affected by the scenic action and how they affect the
adult performers adults in coexistence. How is everyone affected by the
The circular space in a square in the center of the open space of the park? How is the body transformed
city of São Paulo welcomes artists, children, and from the isolation of apartments and private vehicles to
adults who come together in a scenic action. The the collective space, from the car seats and mothers’ laps to
adults initially watch, with the exception of a few the place of performance? And how do adults also become
mothers and fathers who are more inclined to performers? How do they act with children?
dance. The children run around with the plastic By recognizing the uniqueness of each conviviality
bags in the air, gather lots of bags, make a giant of each child who sets out to experiment in the space,
ball, and lie down on it, use the plastic bag as a we open ourselves up to the unpredictability of art that
jumper, let themselves be enveloped by the soap is made there, live, in play. The Mundukuru indigenous
bubbles, try to grab them with their fingers, shout people teach their children to learn about life as it presents
with excitement when surrounded by the bubbles. itself. In the same way, scenic action, movement, and
They also observe the musician’s actions and play performativity are revealed from the children’s bodily
the instruments. They wrap themselves up in the explorations, stimulated by contact with the space and
fabrics, play hide-and-seek with their mothers, and its plasticity and by the interference of the artists, who
use the fabrics to make hammocks, boats, oceans observe them and act to enrich the play, the movement, or
they swim in, rivers they jump across, lie down the relationship between them. As Marina Machado says:
and look at the sky. By now, mothers, fathers, and “If it is in movement that the young child thinks, lives, is
other adults are sharing the play, dancing together,
listening attentively to the poetry, and singing
Escravos de Jó. A big toy appears, and the children
want to touch its parts to see if it makes a sound,
if it stands out from the body, and if they can put
it on. Artists, children, and adults find the places
of their corporalities and let art live in themselves,
among everyone, with the world.

The Covid-19 pandemic kept many families in isolation
for 2 years in the city of São Paulo. The beginning of 2022
was also a time of liberation: with the arrival of vaccines,
we could once again meet those others who had been
separated from us for so long – parents, grandparents, Figure 5. EmQuanta: artistic action in the park of Monteiro Lobato
cousins, friends, teachers, and so many others we did not Public Library, May 21, 2022. Photo by Tadzio Veiga.

Volume 2 Issue 1 (2024) 8 https://doi.org/10.36922/ac.1668