Chilean popular resistance with needle and thread

Fifty years ago, Pinochet staged a coup in Chile. During the dictatorship that followed, women and relatives of missing prisoners came together to depict their lives and traumas through the embroidery of colorful arpilleras.

The exhibition features a selection of arpilleras created between 1975 and 1990. The exhibition is curated by Javier Perugachi and was conceived by Irma Prado Pizarro. Irma came to Belgium from Chile in late 1973, where she supported the arpilleristas out of solidarity starting in 1978. The arpilleras posed a threat to the military regime. Possessing them was considered treason or a crime. That is why they were smuggled out of the country. Irma smuggled hundreds of arpilleras out of her homeland and now exhibits them in various locations.

📏 40 meters
🕑 1 hour
📍 Amsab-ISG Bagattenstraat 174 9000 GHENT