The Aestheticization of Sensory Capitalism: Nocturnal Hyperstimulations in El Alto’s Urban Architecture

Authors

  • Vania Susana Calle Quispe Universidad Mayor de San Andres

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.5195/bsj.2025.377

Keywords:

El Alto, aestheticization, sensory capitalism, overstimulation, nocturnal urbanism, architecture, urbanism

Abstract

The city of El Alto has become a vibrant stage where sensory hyperstimulation redefines the nocturnal urbatectonic (urbanism and architecture) experience. The use of LED and neon lights for commercial purposes generates variable spatial configurations that are permanently and irreversibly deformed under the tensions between public and private space. The aim of this article is to analyze how sensory capitalism has aestheticized the urban landscape through nocturnal lighting, displayed on ornamented façades and the visual effects of “Alteño-style” buildings. Through a qualitative approach and critical urban observation, photographic documentation, and analysis of emblematic cases, the study explores the factors that fuel this aesthetic—linked to consumption and symbolic identity self-affirmation within a self-built context. From a critical perspective, the article examines how visual hyperstimulation not only responds to market-driven strategies operating on an emotional or affective level, where material production is controlled, but also to the production of sensitivity and affect through spectacularization. This is analyzed in the emblematic cases of the “Bumblebee,” “Los Caballeros del Zodiaco,”  and “Cristo  Redentor ” buildings. The findings reveal that this nocturnal aesthetic challenges traditional notions of urban modernity    through a systematic categorization of elements of nocturnal aesthetics, suggesting the urgency of rethinking governance models that integrate the sensory dimension of the nocturnal socio-spatial environment.

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Published

2025-12-11

Issue

Bolivian Studies Journal Vol. 31, 2025

Section

Articles

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