Physical transformation and social appropriations of the Tiradentes square in Ouro Preto-MG

Tiradentes Square, an Ouro Preto’s importante place, has importance in the regional and national scenery. There are studies about its surroundings but no information concerning its historical evolution. In prospect to know its evolutionary process and identifying its landscape representation in the collective unconscious of the inhabitants from Ouro Preto-MG, it was analyzed the city’s urban development and the transformations undergone by this square. The applied method had an interface between inventive and subjective analyzes. This study focused its interest on its morphological transformations and its social representation. It was possible to identify the physical evolution processes and the place’s practices using inventive analysis, and esthetic and symbolic values using the subjective analysis. Tiradentes Square showed his vocation to represent the government, reaching its peak when it received the monument to Tiradentes, becoming a national symbol during the twentieth century.