Healing Veins: snap, it's mine.

i've spent the last few days doing research for a project i'm working on with a band called la culta. la culta is 5, all with deep roots in mataderos and it's daily going-ons. the song 'desaparacido' was written by the group's lead singer, ale, about his older sister who was one of the 30,000 disappeared (state estimates are much lower) during argentina's dirty war that persecuted anyone with even slight hints towards the left. ale's sister, however, was not an intellectual. she wasn't a student who participated in demonstrations. she didn't secretly read marx or host anti-government meetings. instead, she was taken from her mother moments after birth. the family was told she had died during birth but her family is convinced she is one of many children who were stolen from their families and given to supporters of the dictatorship.

the song is about ale's family's years of heart break and disappointment and anger. although ale wasn't born at the time, he's inherited all the burden of a lost sister, the regrets of what could have been, and the emptiness that all family and friends of disappeared share. in the video that i'm helping with, i want to explore this inherited grief. what is lost as grief is passed on from one generation to another? what is gained? what is learned?

i've begun to collect images by argentina photographers that explore similar questions. here's a few ....