Olvido Pa' Recordar (Forget To Remember)

Olvido pa’ Recordar is a journey of reconciling with loss as an act of mourning after seeking asylum in the U.S. and leaving Colombia fourteen years ago. Revisiting a place I once knew, I confront what has been lost: family, home, and self.

Fourteen years ago, my mom and I had to start a new life, seeking asylum in the U.S. A place so unfamiliar and distant from my home in Colombia. I have unsuccessfully worked towards finding a way to call the United States home, feeling a personal disconnection based on my constant, yet failing, emotional search for a home. A lonely feeling has always been present, questioning whether I can ever feel like I really belong here?

In 2017, after not being able to go back for seven years I returned to Colombia seeking to reconnect with the memories, feelings, and people I left behind. But time had changed everything I knew as a home, family, and myself. The country was not the same as when I had to leave.

Colombia has become a new country itself, very different from the place I once knew.  The armed conflict in the country has started slowly transitioning to peace, family members have died, my childhood friends have grown up and apart, and areas of the country that were inaccessible before are opening up. Maybe what I found familiar is long gone.

A strange familiarity accompanied me all along this journey. An understanding that knows that Colombia is where I come from but doesn't acknowledge that time and space are barriers both physical and emotional.

Olvido pa’ Recordar (Forget to Remember) is a journey of reconciling with these losses. Through my images, I confront what is slipping away, exploring the paradox between remembering and letting go, as I confront unspoken truths as an attempt to understand my past in relation to my present. By navigating the space between individual and communal existence. I seek to uncover the tools to keep existing. Healing and letting go are learning to forget to remember as I remember to forget.