Casa Encantada: A Portrait of the Fight for Housing in Belo Horizonte

This book brings together both illustrations by Renato Baruq and photographs by Cadu Passos. During 2022 and 2023, the two Brazilian artists and organizers documented almost 20 old abandoned houses in the central region of Belo Horizonte that became living, social and cultural spaces for people in vulnerable situations during the pandemic. The work is accompanied by interviews conducted between 2022 and 2023, which tell the story of these properties and their inhabitants in their own voices.

For a decade, people from all around the world have been visiting Kasa Invisível for discussions, workshops, movie screenings, concerts, classes, book fairs, and festivals. In addition to hosting events and meetings for unions and social movement groups, Kasa functions daily as a community kitchen, library, infoshop, screen printing workshop, and vegan food cooperative.

During the pandemic and the period of social isolation, the Kasa collective started to organize regular actions to support homeless people and workers in the neighborhood against COVID-19. This involved gathering and donating food, clothing, blankets and hygiene kits alongside other forms of direct action and mutual support.

The book Casa Encantada documents abandoned houses in Belo Horizonte that have been squatted and transformed into homes and social centers. During the pandemic, we saw an explosion in homelessness in Brazil’s urban centers, which led to the emergence of a new wave of occupations of houses and smaller buildings. This network of autonomous squats is represented with delicate pen drawings by Baruq, phographs from C. Passos, and interviews with residents and activists in the squatting movement in Belo Horizonte.