Río Sumpul Massacre Memorial: Trails and Voices – book launch and exhibition

On March 19, the book Rio Sumpul Massacre Memorial: Trails and Voices will be launched alongside the opening of an exhibition at the House of Compassion, which is located in the Saint John the Baptist at the Béguinage Church in Brussels, Belgium.

The exhibition invites visitors to discover the creation process of the Las Aradas monument, along with the stories, voices, and relationships that underpin it. It is an open moment for everyone to share, listen, and engage in dialogue. Several of the documents on display have travelled back from El Salvador, where they were exhibited last year in San Salvador, Suchitoto and San José Las Flores. 

The book presented at the opening sheds light on the memory and resilience of the affected communities. It brings together the voices of survivors, community members, architects, artists, and researchers from various universities. 

Through these intersecting perspectives, the book showcases a collaboration between Asociación Sumpul [Sumpul Association], the Faculty of Architecture of KU Leuven, the School of Art of the  El Salvador University, Western University, Colectivo Matiz [Matiz Collective], and AgwA architecture.

The Surviving Memory in Postwar El Salvador research initiative is supported in part by funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, Western University, KU Leuven, the Canadian Foundation for Innovation, and the Ontario Research Fund.