The family of the singer-songwriter and artist Violeta Parra donated for exhibition at the Municipal Theater, until the end of March, a burlap by the artist that has not been exhibited for 26 years.
In an emotional act at the new Municipal Theater of La Florida, which began its operations for this 2023, Mayor Rodolfo Carter paid a heartfelt tribute to arpillerista women from Villa O’Higgins, for their great cultural and historical legacy as founders of the group of artisan women.
“We wanted to commemorate Women’s Day, recognizing the tremendous work and contribution to the culture and heritage of Florida and the country, to our Villa O’Higgins Arpilleras: Inés, Ida and Eliana, they are living heritage of Florida and your work is an example for future generations, thank you very much for all the history that you have embodied in those scraps of fabric with your needles, threads and embroidery, we want your technique, art and creativity to be transferred to our girls and boys ”, Mayor Carter stated.
In La Florida, in the heart of Villa O’Higgins, a working-class town founded in 1969, the “Arpilleras Workshop” was born as an expression of art through the creation of scenes from the social life of Chile under dictatorship, with pieces and threads of multiple types of fabrics and colors. This trade not only represented an alternative to market and bring an economic contribution to the home, but also turned out to be a testimonial art, with an experiential discourse of the time. That workshop managed to have more than 200 women, of whom only 3 have continued to work since its foundation: Inés Venegas, Eliana Astorga and Ida Marchant.
“How can we not think of all those women who are no longer here, some of them murdered by bad love, but many others who left without being recognized for what they are: the builders of modern Chile. The heroines of the ’80s that we all knew in the common pot, on the barricade, in the church, in the neighborhood, with or without political militancy, in years that were particularly difficult, saved Chile, those same women today, who they are a little over 40 years old, many of them are alone because their partner is no longer there and probably the son to whom they gave their whole life, for whom they washed other people’s clothes, sold matute, sewed and knitted forgot their past and lives in another place and late, badly and never comes to see them,” said Mayor Carter.
“Probably your art is going to be your testimony, little girls, because at each point, each time you pricked your finger, that you crossed a small thread when you watered them with your tears and unforgettable pieces of art flourished in them, which are not only testimony of our history as a people, but fundamentally of something that will keep us together until the end of time, which is love for the other, even someone we do not know, which stands out as the best of us. That is why in this week in which we commemorate International Women’s Day, much more than the raised fist, much more than the march, much more than the protest, what finally changes the world are women like them, who love so infinite. If it becomes true that Chile will be a better country, as I believe it will be, it will not be because of its scientists, or athletes, or its millionaires, or its politicians, it will be because of anonymous women, that one day they went out to earn a living only with the love they had in their hearts, saved their families and unknowingly saved Chile,” said the community authority.
Also present at the activity were the artists Denisse Malebrán, Mónica Carrasco, Gloria Simonetti, Isabel Parra, Magdalena Matthey and Emmily Heslax, who is a former student of the Sol del Illimani artistic school in the commune, who performed a version of “Como la Cicada”. .
“La Familia” is the name that Isabel Parra gave to the burlap that her mother Violeta made at the beginning of the 1960s in her house in La Reina and which belongs to the private collection of the Parra family. It was exhibited for the last time in 1997 at the Louvre, Paris and now, at the Municipal Theater of La Florida, on loan until the end of March. The work is made of jute fabric embroidered in wool with a needle and with a stitch that Violeta invented. “The theme is family. It’s a face that has to be her and some little faces around it, there are 4 of them. The name of the family is obvious, that’s why I named it that way, because not all Violeta’s arpilleras have a name named following her, there are many that I’ve named ”, indicates his daughter Isabel.
Municipal theater
The Municipal Theater of La Florida is located at calle Real Pontevedra Nº6665 and has a total capacity of 494 seats, including areas for wheelchairs. It is contemplated that it will begin its 2023 program with artists such as Fernando Ubiergo, the Maule Classical Orchestra, the tango singer Adriana Varela, De Kiruza, Saiko, among others. In charge of its cultural management is Manuel Meriño and the executive management, Carolina Bravo Larenas.
