Vicaria de la Solidaridad, Solidarity Foundation, and Villa Gremaldi

(a memorial to the victims of the Pinochet regime: on the left, the disappeared; on the right, those murdered; and in the middle, Salvador Allende)

On Friday, we took a trip with ISA to Santiago to look at some of the history of the Human Rights crimes that were committed during the Pinochet regime. Since it has been less than 20 years since Pinochet lost power, this is still a sensitive and polarized subject.

We began out trip with a visit to the Fundacion Vicaria de la Solidaridad, a foundation that worked, during the Pinochet regime with the help of the Catholic Church, to keep records of the people who disappeared, were murdered, or were
tortured by the regime. They have extensive records of what appeared in the media, victim's own statements, the statements of families, and court cases that relate to the violations. As a historian, I think it is amazing that all of these documents are being preserved for future generations to be able to read. However, it is also good for Chile, because these documents have provided many victims and their families with reparations and acknowledgment of what happened to them.

After the Vicaria, we went to the Fundacion Solidaridad, which also began during the imprisonments of the Pinochet regime. In the beginning, they helped prisoners to get artwork they were making in the prisons out to markets in Europe and North America, to be sold to help the prisoners and their families. Today, they help poor artisans all over Chile sell their products to a fair trade market. The artwork they had was absolutely beautiful and I couldn't help buying gifts for friends and family. [From their website, you can browse all of the artwork that is available...]


(one of the original tapestries that was made for the Fundacion Solidaridad to sell)


(carved chicken bones- some of the first artisans' works)

We also visited the general cemetery that was founded by the famous Liberador Bernard O'Higgins (think of him as George Washington for Chileans) in 1821. Here, we saw many tombs of famous Chileans and former Presidents, but we were mainly there to see Patio 29. With the many murders that the Pinochet regime was committing, they needed discreet places to dispose of the bodies. Ironically, one of the places they chose was the cemetery. Patio 29 became a mass grave for many of the victims, and while some were identified, many were identified wrong or not at all.


(some of the old family tombs at the cemetery)


(Salvador Allende's tomb; moved there from Valparaiso after the dictatorship was over)


(walking through the cemetary; notice the difference between these graves and the earlier ones and the ones in the picture that follow - an example of how obvious class difference is in all parts of Chilean society)


(more graves at the back of the cemetery)


(graves on Patio 29 and the sign explaining the significance)

At the end of a long day, we went to Villa Grimaldi, a detention center used by the Chilean secret police to torture political prisoners. Today, it has been turned into a park to memorialize and commemorate the victims and what happened at this center, and in many others throughout Chile.

Our guide is a victim himself, a prisoner of another detention center closer to Valparaiso and the prison in Valparaiso, having suffered through the same treatment as the prisoners at Villa Grimaldi. Having him as guide, and being able to give us his personal experience of what happened was amazing. Instead us just hearing history, we were hearing his story of what had happened to him during these dark times.


(roses to represent the women killed at Villa Grimaldi and in all of Chile from 1973-1989; Michelle Bachelet, current President of Chile, was detained in Villa Grimaldi at the age of 20 with her mother because of her father's support of Allende; both survived and went into exile in Australia after they were released. Soon afterward, she went to East Germany to continue studying medicine)

How the park was designed was also very interesting to me because of how the survivors have chosen to memorialize their experiences. Villa Grimaldi was used until 1978 as a detention camp, when the secret police stopped using it, because it was no longer a hidden location for their activities. Although the regime had begun to destroy the buildings to get rid of the evidence of the camp, most of it was naturally destroyed with the earthquake that hit central Chile in 1985.


(Birch trees planted in the park, representative of the victims - crooked trees whose bark peals, but strong wood that cannot easily be made into something else)

Some of Villa Grimaldi has been rebuilt, such as "La Torre," the tower, and a model cell to show what the conditions of the prisoners were like. Other parts have been made into different types of memorials.

The way that this camp and the crimes have been memorialized and the situation in general remind me a lot of the Nazi crimes, concentration camps, and the way they have been memorialized in Germany; more specifically Berlin, since this was something we focused on during our trip last spring. Many of the concentration camps open as museums for the public to get an idea of what they really were and there are also many memorials throughout Berlin that show where the victims lived, what they did before they were taken away, and the memorial to those who died in the center of Berlin. We had a discussion in Berlin about whether the concentration camps should remain in tact to show the public or whether they should be torn down and replaced by memorials.


(torre and a cell, reconstructed)

I asked our guide whether it was important for him to have rebuilt these buildings in Villa Grimaldi and why it was important for the organization to rebuild these buildings instead of just having the other memorials in the park. He told us that for himself and for the organization, it was extremely important to have the tangible element of the public to see and understand what had happened there. They feel that without this tangible element, visitors can't get the real feeling of what happened, and without that real feeling, the chance that these crimes could happen again is greater. And that is the purpose of the park: to make sure that these crimes never happen again.

And when he put it like that, and I saw the difference and juxtaposition of these memorials, I too felt that it is necessary to have the tangible element of what happened to be able to understand it better.