THE 12 OF PUNTA DEL ESTE

  • Dates
    2014 - Ongoing
  • Author
  • Topics Social Issues, Contemporary Issues, War & Conflicts

In Punta del Este, a neighborhood on the outskirts of Buenaventura, the port capital of the Colombian Pacific; each year the local people commemorate the slaughter of 12 youngs-ters in their community with a “matachines” traditional festival.

In Punta del Este, a neighborhood on the outskirts of Buenaventura, the port capital of the Colombian Pacific; each year the local people commemorate the slaughter of 12 youngs-ters in their community with a “matachines” traditional festival. With masks made by themselves, each year the “matachines” roam the dusty streets between speeches, dances and traditional liquor until drunkenness. 11 years ago, the dancers who were interpreting as “matachines” were taken far from their neighborhood under the pretext of playing a soccer game, then they were massacred and thrown into a swamp.

Ever since, the “matachines” festival remembers the massacre of the 12 of Punta del Este, bounded to a truth that might never appear: the mothers wait, the sons wait, the brothers wait, and while they wait Punta del Este strives between hunger, trash and the lack of opportunities. A dark chapter of the colombian armed conflict where the pain that re-mains shall stay for no one to forget.

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