In Sao Paulo, Brazil, what used to be the city’s most luxurious neighborhood in the 18th century, where the Rural aristocracy who ruled the country lived. After several economic and urban crisis was drastically degraded, due to the decades of abandonment. The former mansions were turned into brothels and drug-hotels and within the dirty streets emerged the largest street drug market in the world.

Because of the severe situation, the area became the most feared block in the city. Drug users who were living within the area were considered a threat by the local society were called “the cracked”.

On 2017 the local municipality began a new project to rebuild the area, which resulted in many conflicts. Violent police actions that exposed the situation globally. For over two years Gui visited the area and began documenting the largest crack-cocaine epidemic in the world. The epidemic changed the neighborhoods and caused thousands of people in search of drugs while on a “chemical trance”.

”I photographed Cracolândia ‘Crackland’s streets and drug-hotels when users were not present. I wanted to show how the regions degradation allowed for emerging drug markets. I built a portable studio and began photographing the portraits of the people with an addiction in local social centers while they were in line waiting for a meal. After a few months I gained their trust and they allowed me to photograph their drug pipes made of the garbage found in the area.

This project aims to be the visual record of a forbidden area occupied by an ignored population. Both the region and its inhabitants were affected by the largest crack-cocaine epidemic in the world.