Projeto parquinho (Project Playground) is an installation by visual artist and teacher Andréa Hygino, composed of five hybrid structures that combine elements from a playground with school chairs that impede the functioning of the playground toys. The work was specially commissioned for Espaço Petrobrás and reflects on mechanisms of control and discipline in the school environment. Through the structure and image of the playground, it questions the rules that determine teaching and learning processes.
The playground is one of the main social spaces dedicated to children’s play. It is designed to encourage specific ways of playing and is often found in schoolyards, squares and recreational spaces. Its structure anticipates bodily actions: a swing is made for swinging, a slide for sliding, a seesaw for moving up and down.
The school, as a place for learning and socialisation, teaches codes and norms, shapes behaviours, and evaluates conduct and progress, often without reflection, critique or counterpoint. In Hygino’s work, discipline and control are challenged by the impossibility of obeying the rules of the game. The monochromatic uniformity of the installation relates to the dissected metallic structure of the chairs, presenting a conflict between rigidity and movement, between the desire to use the toy and the frustration of not being able to use it.
Projeto parquinho is part of the work on education Andréa Hygino has been developing for more than ten years, for which she investigates the conditioning and possibilities inherent to teaching and educational processes, starting from the classroom and moving on to other spaces. As part of the project, educational materials will be distributed to school groups, inviting them to think about alternative forms of playing through a series of actions.