The international exchange, “Transformative Memory: Constructing Knowledge from Dialogue and in the Territory,” brought together artists, academics, and community leaders from seven countries to Bogota and the Montes de Maria in Colombia in February 2020.
Forty artists, activists, and academics from countries such as Indonesia, Canada, Peru, Uganda, Colombia, the USA, and Northern Ireland met for six days (February 16-22) in Bogotá and in the Montes de María region of Colombia. This was an international exchange to think big about the concept of transformative memory.
This initiative was organized by the University of British Columbia (UBC), in partnership with the National University of Colombia and the Montes de Maria Communications Collective – Line 21, and with the support of the University of the Andes and the studio of visual artist Erika Diettes.
As Co-Principal Investigators Professor Erin Baines (UBC School of Public Policy and Global Affairs) and Professor Pilar Riaño (UBC Gender, Race, Sexuality and Social Justice Institute) stated: “Although each of us has different histories and praxis, the shared desire to think anew about the aftermaths and afterlives of violence and dispossession in our countries, territories and nations brings us here today.”
The encounter’s purpose was to reflect and explore how the experience of exchange, dialogue, and visiting territories, where various historical memory initiatives are being developed, can transform into a knowledge-building methodology.
