Saturday, 23 November 2024

Textile Details

'Lucía, Lucía, la olla está vacía / The pots are empty', Anonymous. (Photo: Colin Peck)
'Lucía, Lucía, la olla está vacía / The pots are empty', Anonymous. (Photo: Colin Peck)

 

Title of Textile:Lucía, Lucía, la olla está vacía / Lucia, Lucia, The pots are empty
Maker: Anonymous, Vicariate of Solidarity workshop
Country of Origin: Chile
Year Produced: 1980c
Size (cm): 46 cm (w) x 38 cm (l)
Materials: Scraps of material hand sewn onto burlap
Type of Textile: Arpillera
Description:

As with several arpilleras from the early years of the Pinochet dictatorship, this piece brings us face to face with the daily poverty experienced by so many people, as a result of the harsh economic policies of General Pinochet. One response of local people was to set up soup kitchens: "We fight hunger by the way of organizing a community soup kitchen." (testimony received from a community organization in Santiago de Chile in 1983).

On many occasions, women, men and children banged empty pots with wooden spoons following a well known rhythm and singing a song addressed to Lucia Pinochet, wife of General Pinochet: "Lucía, Lucía, la olla está vacía."

This slogan, born from their daily experience of hunger in the shantytowns, was echoed during the widespread protests organized against the dictatorship between 1978 and 1990.

Owner: Conflict Textiles collection. Provenance Marjorie Agosín
Location: Fundació Ateneu Sant Roc (Badalona)
Original / Replica: Original
Photographer: Colin Peck
Provenance: Donation from Marjorie Agosín, Chile/USA (2012) (HM0724)





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