Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Brazils Renegade
Balloonists
by Felipe Fernandes Cruz
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October 2014
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Of Paper, Glue, and Popular History:
Creating Balloons
The process of creating a balloon starts with an
idea. Typically, the more artistically inclined baloeiro on a team sketches designs. The next step
is to choose a shape, and create a mold on which
the design can be transferred. While traditionally this was all done by hand, nowadays baloeiros
work with several software tools as well as online
databases of previous designs.
Once the design is complete, the extremely laborious process of piecing the balloon together starts.
The complex designs you see in the photos are
not painted or drawn on the balloon: each swath
of color is a hand-cut piece of paper. Each piece
is cut and glued together in a process that takes
months. It is a very ephemeral art. Indeed, most
of the enjoyment of ballooning lays in the crafting
itself. A team will work for months to create a balloon, and then only get to watch it for some thirty
minutes before its shape becomes indistinguishable in the sky.
Once the balloon is complete, the baloeiros work
on a propulsion system. There is a delicate balance to be achieved here: the balloons are made
of paper, but propelled by fire. For this purpose,
a metal ring is created and affixed to the bottom
opening of the balloon, known as the boca, or
mouth (people who interfere with a launch by loitering around the opening are jokingly referred
to as dentistas). The metal ring has a center shelf
where the torch is loaded, keeping it away from
the paper sides. Even though this structure is not
visible once the balloon is launched, teams sometimes take great pains to embellish them, creating
wire sculptures to hold the torcha proper altar
for the pyre which will take their beloved craft to
the skies.
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The candles are sourced from churches and cemeteries, melted, then spread over a thick sheet of
cotton or cloth. The excess wax is squeezed out,
and the cloth is rolled up into a log. The logs are
arranged and piled on the central metal structure,
and voilayou have a powerful torch that can heat
the air in the balloon for several hours.
There is one thing balloonists like almost as much
as making balloonstalking about them. Despite
the fact that launching balloons is now a federal
crime, there are myriad publications and resources about balloons. Some traditional balloon magazines have existed since the early 1980s. There are
photographers specializing strictly in balloons
balgrafoswho sell balloon photo books and
launch footage DVDs, available anywhere from
street stalls to the internet. Searching for balo
on YouTube will bring up endless hours of footage. Sometimes these balgrafos are even hired to
create balografias (yes, a balloon bibliography) of a
teams entire history of launches, much like a family might commission a genealogy. Balloon teams
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Landing in Concrete and Disgrace:
The Criminalization of Balloons
This is not a crime
This is our art!
True baloeiros decorating the skyline
Baloeiro Funk
by MC Coruja (Rio de Janeiro)
I am baloeiro, I am
concrete plan emerges from paper
and flies, coloring the skies []
always united, by the law persecuted
our culture is our resistance
I am baloeiro, I am!
Baloeiro Rap
by Rapper Cleyton (So Paulo)
What comes up must come down. And when balloons come down, they are not alonebut rather
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in prison. The newspaper columnist, sarcastically responding to the reader, wrote that
he had a confession: he loves balloons and
thinks that festas juninas cannot go on without them, so please direct all complaints to
the editor-in-chief.
But violence and the risk of fires were becoming troublesome issues for baloeiros, and the
press more frequently reported on the risks
of balloons. Such fires were not only an urban concern. Environmentalists also started
blaming baloeiros for putting nature preserves at risk. Rio de Janeiros Floresta da Tijuca and So Paulos Mata Atlntica are some
of the largest urban forests in the world. Many
started pointing out that balloons flying over
the concrete and green jungles of So Paulo
and Rio de Janeiro could just as easily land in
the green areas and destroy environmental
protection areas.
In fact, resgate stories from baloeiros reveal
that they did indeed often retrieve balloons
from forests. One group of balloonists interviewed by the Planeta Balo magazine recounted a story where they had to negotiate over a
balloon not with other balloonists, but rather
with Indians. The balloon was launched in
So Paulo and headed towards the coast, going down the coastal range and over the Mata
Atlntica forest, landing in an indigenous reservation. According to their narrative, the Indians threw rocks at them while they climbed
the trees to get the balloon. Much like they
did with the police in the city, the baloeiros
pulled their money together to bribe the Indians with $60 to retrieve the balloon.
TV news increasingly reported sensationalistic stories of the dangers of ballooning, and
public opinion started turning against baloeiros. The proliferation of the balloons had
made them more dangerous, and soon there
were calls for prohibition. That day finally
came.
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A balloon banner where a little balloon cries for help. The banner
reads they want to finish me.
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Some well known baloeiros have tried to organize in order to address some of the criticism
and lobby for the legalization of the balloon.
In 1998, they founded the Sociedade Amigos do
Balo (Society for Friends of the Balloon, or
SAB) with that very goal in mind. Some SAB
members have proposed a solution similar
to one which regulated Carnaval decades ago:
the construction of the sambdramo, an official stadium-like arena where parades can be
held. The SAB proposed a baldramo outside
the city, with stadium seating, where balloons could be launched at designated times
in a regimented fashion regulated by the state
government. The baldramo is the solution
that comes the closest to resolving air traffic
issues, since the airspace around it could be
reserved much like it is for other aerial sports,
such as the manned hot-air ballooning practiced elsewhere in the world.
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We dont know what the future holds for baloeiros. Much like balloons rise and fall, baloeiros came from modest roots, launched
into an explosive phenomenon, and then
were criminalized. It seems that for now, they
remain in a state of suspension.
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