Monday 16 March 2009

Peru: La teta asustada/Yuyanapaq/CVR

Peruvian blog Utero de Marita has published a video interview with Magaly Solier, protagonist of La teta asustada, visiting the Yuyanapaq exhibition in the Museo de la Nacion. It's very interesting to hear her discuss her childhood memories and her reactions to the images. The post is here, I've also embedded the video here (both Spanish language):



Also, thanks to Conflictos sociales en el Peru for drawing my attention to the fact that the Truth and Reconciliation Commission's (CVR) digital image bank is online. Woohoo!

It is only a slight exaggeration to say that I have been waiting for several years for this moment. Seriously, when I went to Peru in late 2005 I spoke to one of the curators of Yuyanpaq and asked her when the image bank was going to be up and running. She informed me that there were no funds available for the project at that time; in any case, all energy was going towards reopening the physical exhibition in the Museo de la Nacion, which was fair enough. Ever since, when you clicked on the 'Banco de imagenes' resource on the CVR it just had an "under construction" notice. I had pretty much given up that the digital archive was ever going to appear. But now there it is! The final Yuyanapaq exhibition was selected from these images, which in turn came from the collections of media sources, human rights organisations, government agencies and private individuals. You can see all the images or search by source, topic, date, location, key word or photographer.

This is a fantastic resource for those interested in memory, history, and human rights in Peru, and it's free and accessible to all with an interest connection (which, I am well aware, is far from everyone in Peru, but coverage is increasing all the time). I'll be using the image bank in the near future for some of my planned future posts on photography and memory, but in the meantime, go and check it out for yourself.

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