Pichação - São Paulo grafitti art

São Paulo, the economic capital of Brazil, is home to a unique writing movement known as ‘pichação’. This Brazilian word for tag, represents a phenomenon that surpasses all known occurrences of graffiti in terms of sheer coverage – you see pichações all over the city. Pichação first appeared in its current form in the streets during the mid-1980s, and since 1990 has gradually colonised the façades and tops of a variety of buildings in the capital reaching a climax in the second half of the 1990s. The São Paulo milieu is unique because, unlike most other American, European and even Asian graffiti scenes, which reproduce New York letterforms more or less faithfully, the pichações have developed a totally different imaginary calligraphy.Stylistically they were originally influenced by heavy metal and hardcore logos of record sleeves of the 1980s (AC/DC, Iron Maiden, Slayer or the Dead Kennedys), whose aesthetic has been adopted by local Brazilian bands such as Sepultura.