Sérgio Péo was born in Pará in 1947 and at the age of 12 he moved to Rio de Janeiro, where he lives. He is an architect / urban planner, filmmaker, poet, visual artist. He studied architecture and urbanism at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro and soon started to use cinema to question housing conditions and urban behavior in the city. His films Pira (1972), Na Maré Com Ho Chi Minh (1974), Rocinha Brasil 77, (awarded at the Jornada de Salvador and honorable mention at the Obenhauser Festival, Germany); Associação dos Moradores dos Guararapes (best short film at the Gramado Festival in 1979), and Urban Contradictions (1981) address these issues.