The veils that you see in this courtyard draw us closer to the 2,238 victims who perished at Paterna during the Franco regime. For decades, their stories remained in a liminal space enveloped in the darkness generated by a forced social invisibility. However, through the use of our individual and collective memory, we can cross this threshold and shine light to the darkness, repair the damage, and arrive at the truth.
This installation tries to evoke that threshold. The jute sacks filled with earth from Paterna Cemetery symbolise the act of burying as a means for oblivion and the imposed silence that follows. These jute sacks anchor the veils in darkness, attempting to have these remain still. However, as the veils raise upwards, the darkness fades to reveal faces, and as a group, these show other faces which can be seen through the layered transparencies. In the upper part of the veils, we find a whiteness that symbolises a space of truth, and in this we can read the written letters from the victims who wanted to leave their testimonies to future generations.
