A Justice Site
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California State University, Dominguez Hills
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Soka University Japan - Transcend Art and Peace
Created: August 19, 2002
Latest Update: August 23, 2002
jeannecurran@habermas.org
takata@uwp.edu
Los Desparecidos
The Disappeared of Guatemala
This painting was done in response to a photograph in the New York Times by Wesley Bocxe. Whereas Maria Pia Lara speaks of story narratives as a means of demanding recognition for those voices that have been suppressed, painting also demands recognition. In this version of my painting the brilliant reds and pinks, especially as I overlaid Wesley Bocxe's photograph, were a conscious demand for the recognition of los desparecidos.
Fighters' Demands Open Old Wounds in Central America By DAVID GONZALEZ New York Times. August 19, 2002. At p. A 1. Backup.
Wesley Bocxe for The New York Times
A chapel in Plan de Sánchez, Guatemala, built to commemorate the 184 people killed in a massacre in 1982.This photo of a chapel in Guatemala is a cry for recognition in the sense that Maria Pia Lara speaks of that cry. Those who appear in photographs all around the altar are the "disappeared," the "assassinated" of what is now considered by many the genocidal wars in Guatemala. When you recognize that the "fighters" demanding compensation are the men who were forced into service in killing those represented by the photos, you begin to get a sense of the terrible complexity of war.
jeanne tampered with the photo using her corel photo house program. The red was reminiscent of the hell of the disappeared. I liked the balance of the one young woman who was there to represent all the disappeared and maybe, the Virgin. The people, barely seen on the right, represent the continuing pain of the disappeared.
Los Desparecidos
The Disappeared of Guatemala
Site Copyright: Jeanne Curran and Susan R. Takata and Individual Authors, August 2002.
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