January 13, 2026

Cities and Urban Cultures

Carlos Fortuna

With a simple touch, our mobile devices can display fragments of urban scenes, creating a parallel city in the form of a digital mosaic. These visual impressions result from the widespread use of smartphone cameras, socio-technical devices that enable users to capture, edit and share images through social media platforms such as Instagram. This thesis aims to analyse the emergence of visual urbanities on the Instagram platform, as well as the new dimensions of post-photographic practices and their role in the construction of urban representations and imaginaries. These practices result from the mediation of the smartphone socio-technical device and the reconfiguration of photographic values in the context of new communication technologies. Two Portuguese cities with a significant presence on Instagram were selected as case studies: #Lisboa and #Porto. The methodological approach combines digital ethnography, visual analysis and image cartography to investigate the interconnections between post-photographic practices of urban materiality and the visual flows of the social digital network. In the field research, the post-photographic performances recorded correspond to the main foci of visual attention: São Bento station and the D. Luís I bridge in Porto, as well as the viewpoints and streets of the Alfama neighbourhood and Praça do Comércio in Lisbon. These spaces, conceptualised as urban (micro)territories, possess a particular visual identity that guided the post-photographic trajectories within the studied spaces, providing a documentary record of the practices and performances of Instagrammers. Based on ethnographic observations and visual analysis, three axes of analysis were identified: 1) identity, creativity and urban perspectives; 2) everyday architectures; and 3) consumption and urban tourism. These networked urban visualities encompass multiple forms of representation and re-signification of urban spaces marked by visual inequalities. The analysis reveals that these visual urbanities express both hegemonic urban aesthetics related to tourism and consumption, as well as creative approaches to everyday life and elements rooted in local culture. These images reveal fissures in the visual hegemony of the network, demonstrating a potential for counter-gazes - however subtle - against the dominant visual construction. The visual urbanities of Lisbon and Porto present an overlay of expressions and meanings that shape the 'Instagrammable' city.

Keywords: Instagrammable city, Visual urbanities, Smartphone, Digital ethnography