¡Compañero Víctor Jara, presente ahora y siempre!: memorial narrative and legacy in the elaboration of Archivo Víctor Jara (1973-1994)

• Grant number: 21/07314-7
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Master
• Start date: August 01, 2022
• End date: October 31, 2023
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - History - Modern and Contemporary History
• Principal Investigator: Tania da Costa Garcia
• Grantee: Maria Luiza Franca Ramalho
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Ciências Humanas e Sociais (FCHS). Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Campus de Franca. Franca , SP, Brazil

Abstract

Multiple artist, Víctor Jara (1932-1973) was a theater director, actor, folklorist, singer, composer and one of the main names of the New Chilean Song movement. militant of Chilean Communist Party, offered support to Salvador Allende during the electoral campaign of Popular Unit in 1970 and later became part of the elected government, named as Cultural Ambassador (1970-1973). In September 1973, a few days after the civil-military coup, Víctor was tortured and executed at Estadio Chile. After the tragic murder, his artistic legacy and political and personal trajectory were re-signified, serving a narrative memorial that placed his figure as a martyr of resistance. Dancer Joan Jara, widow of artist, was a central figure in this process. From exile in London in October 1973, Joan preserved items from her personal collection - letters, press clippings, photographs, records and robes - striving to perpetuate Víctor's "legacy" and militancy for the Humans together with the solidarity and resistance networks formed in Europe. Founded in 1994, in the context of redemocratization in Chile, the Archivo Víctor Jara is constituted as a institutional organization for the custody and conservation of the "legacy" of Jara. Using the clippings of press preserved by Joan Jara initially in her collection, with a view to building the Archivo, the present project proposes to investigate how the memorial narrative about the figure of Victor Jara was built. As well as identifying the representations, identities and silences involved in the formulation and dissemination of the memorial narrative about his figure, trajectory and legacy engendered in the creation of the collection. (AU)