Number Seven - Escadaria Selaron

The first time I heard about Escadaria Selaron - The Selaron Steps  - was back in 2006 while I was working for Euro-Center, a company handling European Travel Insurance. A young couple of backpackers came by the office and asked us for directions to the Selaron Steps and I had to admit I had never heard of them...

Well, on a beautiful May morning in Rio I figured it was about time I finally went to see the Steps.I walked from Cinelandia towards the borough of Lapa and passed Sala Cecilia Meireles, a concert hall, now beautifully restored, but that will be another post...

As I got closer to the steps I realized there were lots of tourists with maps and cellphones, nowadays only people going on fifty, like myself, use cameras to take pictures. Entering the Rua Teotonio Regadas, I stopped to take a picture with my old fashioned camera of some street art:

A little bit further up on the same street, painted on a wall was this girl, it was love at first sight:

And then I got the first glimpse of the steps:

There were tourist everywhere, and also the usual mix of souvenir salespeople, people offering drinks kept cold in styrofoam boxes, and a guitar player  - playing Brazilian music.

Jorge Selaron was born in Chile, he was an artist and decided to settle in Rio de Janeiro in 1983. He began the art work on the steps that ran beside his house in 1990. In the beginning he used blue, yellow and green tiles to cover the steps, mostly he found the tiles in piles of urban waste or at construction sites. Later he started receiving donations from visitors from all over the world. Today the stairs are a puzzle of tiles, ceramics and mirrors.

As I walked up the steps every step and corner and sidewall revealed small treasures:

Some of my favorites, as everybody knows, houses and doors are my obsessions...

Selaron said his work was his tribute to the Brazilian people. His real passion was painting and many of the paintings featured the same pregnant woman:

The Steps was what brought him fame, though, and he continued the work on the steps until his death. Selaron was found dead on the very same steps on January 10, 2013. His body was found with burn marks, the cause of his death was never fully discovered.

I left the Steps profoundly touched and convinced that sometimes one man's work can change his surroundings...

 

Thank you Jorge Selaron!