BEGIN:VCALENDAR VERSION:2.0 PRODID:-//InvisionCommunity Events 4.7.23//EN METHOD:PUBLISH CALSCALE:GREGORIAN REFRESH-INTERVAL:PT15M X-PUBLISHED-TTL:PT15M X-WR-CALNAME:RMCommunityCalendar NAME:RMCommunityCalendar BEGIN:VTIMEZONE TZID:Europe/London TZURL:http://tzurl.org/zoneinfo/Europe/London X-LIC-LOCATION:Europe/London BEGIN:DAYLIGHT TZOFFSETFROM:+0000 TZOFFSETTO:+0100 TZNAME:BST DTSTART:20250330T020000Z RRULE:FREQ=YEARLY;BYMONTH=3;BYDAY=-1SU END:DAYLIGHT BEGIN:STANDARD TZOFFSETFROM:+0100 TZOFFSETTO:+0000 TZNAME:GMT DTSTART:20251026T020000Z RRULE:FREQ=YEARLY;BYMONTH=10;BYDAY=-1SU END:STANDARD END:VTIMEZONE BEGIN:VEVENT SUMMARY:SKIN OF GLASS - the Pele de Vidro in Sao Paulo Brasil 05/11/ 2025 DTSTAMP:20250511T224307Z SEQUENCE:0 UID:270-7-c3fe8195a3dde498d013e477e2142422@aalbc.com ORGANIZER;CN="richardmurray":troy@aalbc.com DESCRIPTION:\n SKIN OF GLASS - the Pele de Vidro in Sao Paulo Brasil\n\n \n\n U.R.L.\n\n https://www.pbs.org/video/skin-of-glass-3uc64q/\n\n\n\n VI DEO FULL VIDEO\n\n\n\n \n\n\n\n VIDEO EXCERPT\n\n\n\n \n\n\n\n  \n\n\n\n TRANSCRIPT FULL MOVIE\n\n\n\n ♪ [Water bubbling] ♪ ♪ [Denise Zmekhol speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ [Wind blowing] Zmekh ol: I left Brazil for a new life in California... with only memories of my father-- the bitter and the sweet... ♪ but now so many years later\, ne ws arrives about my father's legacy that reopens childhood wounds and call s me back home to São Paulo... ♪ searching for my father in the work he created.\n\n♪ ♪ This is what brought me back.\n\n♪ It's shocking to see what's happened to my father's architectural masterpiece\, knowing wh at it once was.\n\n♪ ♪ [Man speaking Portuguese] [Woman speaking Portu guese] ♪ [Man speaking Portuguese] [Man speaking Portuguese] ♪ [Man sp eaking Portuguese] [Woman speaking Portuguese] [Man speaking Portuguese] ♪ [Woman speaking Portuguese] ♪ Zmekhol: A vision of the future 24 st ories above São Paulo\, the Pele de Vidro-- Skin of Glass.\n\nMy father d esigned it in the 1960s\, and I was conceived at the same time as this bui lding.\n\n♪ My father was everything a daughter could have dreamed of-- playful\, charming\, affectionate.\n\n♪ He was born in Paris to parents who immigrated from Syria and then made their new life in Brazil.\n\n♪ C urious\, determined\, the top of his class\, he became a prolific architec t as soon as he graduated... ♪ but who was my father as a young man?\n\n Going through these photos makes me realize how little I know about his pa st.\n\nWe never got a chance to talk about his early years.\n\nAt 29\, he met my mother Graca\, like him\, a child of Syrian-Lebanese immigrants\, a nd together\, they began building dreams.\n\n♪ By their wedding day\, my father had already designed our family home.\n\n♪ ♪ [Man speaking Por tuguese] Zmekhol: Everything felt possible in those days.\n\nIt was a time of great hope and optimism in Brazil.\n\n[Astrud Gilberto singing in Port uguese] ♪ [Lores speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ ♪ [Woman speaking Portug uese] Zmekhol: Brasilia\, the new capital city\, was built from the ground up in 3 short years.\n\n♪ Our country was moving toward modernization a nd social reform after centuries of extreme inequality.\n\n♪ My parents visited Brasilia during construction.\n\n♪ I can only imagine how this e pic project inspired my father.\n\n♪ At the age of 32\, he was beginning the most significant work of his lifetime\, the Pele de Vidro.\n\n♪ [Me yer speaking Portuguese] [Man speaking Portuguese] ♪ [Man speaking Portu guese] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ [Zmekhol speaking Portuguese] ♪ [Gunshot] [Screaming] [Shouting] Construction of the Pele de Vidro was almost finis hed in 1964 when Brazil's military staged a coup with backing from the Uni ted States.\n\nIt was the height of the Cold War\, and the U.S. feared tha t Brazil was leaning toward communism.\n\n21 years of dictatorship followe d\, brutally ending Brazil's hopes for social reform.\n\nOur promising\, t ropical democracy vanished... ♪ but I was living in a child's world\, sa fe in the home my father built\, surrounded by family and friends.\n\n♪ Yara\, our closest neighbor\, was like another mother to me.\n\n♪ ♪ [Y ara speaking Portuguese] Yara: Heh!\n\n♪ ♪ ♪ [Man singing in Portu guese] ♪ [Rumbling] [Whistle blows\, explosion] ♪ [Explosion] ♪ [Exp losion] ♪ [People screaming] ♪ Zmekhol: In time\, I began to understan d what was really going on.\n\nThe military censored the media and torture d\, killed\, and exiled people they said were communists.\n\n♪ My father 's colleagues at the school of architecture remember that time well.\n\n ♪ ♪ ♪ [Zmekhol speaking Portuguese] [Zmekhol speaking Portuguese] [C hico Buarque's \"Apesar de Voce\" playing] [Zmekhol speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ ♪ As a child\, I often passed by the Pele De Vidro\, but I neve r went inside.\n\nNow I come here hoping to meet the people who have made this place their home... but I can't get in.\n\nI need the approval of the occupation leaders.\n\n[Man speaking Portuguese] Zmekhol: So I wait\, loo king in from outside.\n\nI hear Portuguese\, Spanish\, French\, kids playi ng... a mother calling her child.\n\nI'm so curious about the lives within my father's creation.\n\n♪ People were at the heart of his work.\n\n♪ He designed the Pele de Vidro with great care for the life inside.\n\nAt a time when most offices were dark and closed\, he created a space of ligh t and transparency\, a structure open to the world around it.\n\n♪ This is the only photo I ever found of my father at the Pele de Vidro\, standin g on the rooftop\, about to transform the skyline of São Paulo.\n\n♪ [W oman speaking Portuguese] [Wisnik speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ [Botti spea king Portuguese] ♪ [Woman speaking Portuguese] Zmekhol: Finding my fathe r's drawings at the School of Architecture is a revelation.\n\nI had no id ea how much was here.\n\n[Ferreira de Brito speaking Portuguese] [Paper ru stling] ♪ ♪ [Zmekhol speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ [Camera shutter clicks] Zmekhol: Gal was one of my father's students.\n\nTogether\ , we go around São Paulo visiting the buildings my father designed.\n \n♪ ♪ ♪ [Rapid clicking] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ Zmekhol: And finally\, the house my father built for our family.\n\nIt feels so strange that it's now someone else's home.\n\nZmekhol: This garden\, so full of memories.\n\nRu nning in circles with my brother... summer dinners with neighbors and frie nds... but there are shadows here of harder times.\n\n♪ When I was 11\, I began to sense a growing tension between my parents.\n\n♪ Some nights\ , lying in bed\, I could hear my mother crying.\n\n♪ ♪ [Yara speaking Portuguese] ♪ Zmekhol: And then one day\, my father left.\n\n♪ ♪ [Sp eaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ I've been waiting 6 weeks.\n\nThe o ccupation leaders say they're asking the residents for permission to let m e in... but then\, they stop returning my calls.\n\nWatching the people\, I begin to recognize faces and feel the rhythms of their lives.\n\nWe are separated by distance and privilege\, yet\, in a strange way\, bound toget her by what we share-- a home made by my father.\n\n[Man speaking Portugue se] Zmekhol: The Pele de Vidro is one of over 70 buildings downtown occupi ed by people who need homes.\n\nThe housing crisis has sparked a movement. \n\n[Loud banging] [Indistinct chatter] [Cheering] [Man speaking Portugues e] [Indistinct chatter] [Chucre speaking Portuguese] Zmekhol: Péricles is helping me negotiate with the leaders of the Pele de Vidro\, and he takes me to one of the occupations he organizes.\n\n[Child speaking Portuguese] [Péricles speaking Portuguese] [Woman speaking Portuguese] [Ribeiro spea king Portuguese] [Péricles speaking Portuguese] [Mendes da Rocha speaking Portuguese] [Meyer speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ ♪ [Acayaba speaking Por tuguese] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ [Zmekhol speaking Portuguese] [Yara speaking Port uguese] ♪ ♪ Zmekhol: At my father's funeral\, I felt like a stranger.. . our angry last words still stinging my heart.\n\nEven with Yara there\, I felt totally alone.\n\n♪ [Sirens] Zmekhol: A few years after my father died\, the federal police made the Pele de Vidro their headquarters... a place for censoring journalists and artists.\n\n♪ My father's creation o f openness and light became a center of fear and surveillance... [People c lamoring] but the dictatorship was faltering.\n\nPeople across the country were demanding free elections.\n\n[Cheering and applause] After two decad es of struggle\, democracy was restored.\n\nThe federal police\, now worki ng under a democratic government\, stayed in the Pele de Vidro.\n\n[Indist inct chatter] [Cameras clicking] They made international headlines identif ying the remains of the Nazi war criminal Josef Mengele.\n\nThe federal po lice left the building in 2003... and for years\, the Pele de Vidro stood empty and neglected.\n\n♪ ♪ [Lores speaking Portuguese] [Rain falling] [Man speaking Portuguese] ♪ Zmekhol: It would break my father's heart t o see his Pele de Vidro like this\, as it does mine... but I see this plac e has become a shelter\, its walls protecting so many\, and this touches m y heart.\n\n♪ ♪ ♪ [Péricles speaking Portuguese] Zmekhol: I've trie d so hard to get inside the Pele de Vidro\, but after so many months of ne gotiations\, the door is closed... but I am not giving up.\n\nI go to my f ather's birthplace... the city he loved and would visit often.\n\nI'm here to meet an architect with a deep connection to the Pele de Vidro.\n\n[Spe aking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ Zmekhol: Pablo's dream c ame to an end\, and the building remained empty... ♪ but a few years lat er\, the Skin of Glass became a canvas for another vision\, a radical stre et art called pixacão.\n\n♪ Zmekhol: When I first met Rafael\, he was v ery guarded\, not sure how I felt about his art on the Pele de Vidro.\n\nI wasn't sure either.\n\n♪ [Rafael speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ Zmekhol: A few months after Rafael's pixacão\, people occupied the P ele de Vidro for the first time.\n\nA local filmmaker documented them movi ng in.\n\nFinally\, a window inside.\n\nAll this time I imagined if I coul d only get into the Pele de Vidro\, I would find my father there... ♪ bu t I'm grateful to see this glimpse of life inside.\n\n♪ ♪ [Pablo speak ing Portuguese] [Distant sirens] [Low rumbling] [Sirens growing closer] [O verlapping sirens and horns] [Fire roaring] [Radio chatter] [Glass shatter ing] [Woman speaking Portuguese] Hey\, hey\, hey!\n\n♪ ♪ ♪ [Zmekhol speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ ♪ [Woman speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ [Indi stinct chatter] ♪ [Zmekhol speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ Zmekhol: The gov ernor\, the mayor\, even the president appear for the cameras... but none of them meet with the survivors just one block away.\n\n[Indistinct chatte r] [Barbosa speaking Portuguese] [Speaking Portuguese] [Indistinct chatter ] ♪ [Zmekhol speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ ♪ [Speaking Portuguese] [Ind istinct chatter] [Speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ [Woman speaking Portuguese] [Indistinct chatter] [Zmekhol speaking Portuguese] [Indistinct chatter] [ Speaking Portuguese] Zmekhol: This is one of the leaders who kept me out o f the Pele de Vidro\, who abandoned the survivors after the fire.\n\nSoon after he and the other Pele de Vidro leaders were questioned by the police \, they went into hiding.\n\nMonths later\, the camp is gone without a tra ce\, shut down by the city\, the survivors scattered throughout São Paulo \, looking for shelter.\n\nMany simply vanished into the streets.\n\n[Man speaking Portuguese] [Péricles speaking Portuguese] [Speaking French] Zme khol: Pablo and Philippe have come from France to honor my father's dream and their own.\n\n♪ ♪ ♪ [Philippe speaking French] ♪ Zmekhol: This drawing will never be more than a dream\, a vision of what might have bee n.\n\n♪ Pablo and Philippe invite Rafael\, the pixacão artist\, to join them.\n\n♪ [Rafael speaking Portuguese] ♪ [Pablo speaking French] ♪ ♪ [Alves speaking Portuguese] [Speaking Portuguese] Ha ha ha!\n\n[S peaking Portuguese] ♪ Hmm.\n\n♪ [Man singing in Portuguese] ♪ ♪ ♪ [Zmekhol speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪\n\n\n\n\n\n  \n\n\n\n  \n\n DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20250511 RRULE:FREQ=YEARLY;INTERVAL=1 END:VEVENT END:VCALENDAR