Uruguay | Workshop and film

17.30-19.00: Workshop „Productive remembrance in Uruguay“ with Yannik Holsten (Hamburg)

19.00-19.30: Break (with catering)

19.30-21.30: Film „Compañeros – La Noche de 12 Años / Die Zwölfjährige Nacht“ (2018, 122 min.):In the Fritz Bauer Library we will show the film by director Álvaro Brechner in Spanish with German subtitles.

Location: Fritz Bauer Forum, Feldmark 107, 44803 Bochum

Registration: We look forward to receiving your registration for the workshop by 31 October 2023 at: magdalena.koehler@buxus-stiftung.de

Workshop with Yannik Holsten

27 June this year marked the 50th anniversary of the coup d’état in Uruguay, which marked the beginning of a civil-military dictatorship that lasted twelve years. The crimes committed against thousands of civilians in the name of the state are deeply engraved in the consciousness of Uruguayan society. Many victims and their families still live today in the painful realisation that the majority of those responsible for the crimes live unmolested among them and that the likelihood of finding out the unresolved fates of the „disappeared“ and bringing the perpetrators to justice decreases with each passing year.

At the same time, parts of the current government are endeavouring to discredit any form of remembrance culture and generally regard the dictatorship period as a closed chapter of national history with no impact on the present day. However, in dialogue with those directly and indirectly affected by the crimes, it becomes clear that the reality of life for many people in the country is being misjudged. The workshop will focus on the various ways in which contemporary witnesses come to terms with the past and how they can contribute to the debate and raise public awareness.

Yannik Holsten, born in Hamburg in 1997, spent a year in Colombia as a volunteer for the German government’s „weltwärts“ programme after graduating from high school. At the end of his degree in Politics, Administration and Organisation at the University of Potsdam, he completed a six-month internship at the Bertolt Brecht House (Casa Bertolt Brecht) in Montevideo, Uruguay. There he conducted interviews with contemporary witnesses of the civil-military dictatorship on behalf of the BUXUS STIFTUNG.

Film screening „Compañeros – La Noche de 12 Años / The Twelve Year Night“

The film tells the deeply moving story of three companions (compañeros) in Uruguay, which, despite all the horrors and despite torture and years in prison, is ultimately encouraging. It is an almost unbelievable story of the power of the human spirit, based on the novel Memorias del Calabozo by the Uruguayan writer Mauricio Rosencof and the later Uruguayan Minister of Defence Eleuterio Fernández Huidobro. The third member of the group was José Pepe Mujica, who later became President of Uruguay and was imprisoned in solitary confinement with his two companions for twelve years. It was the time of the military dictatorship in Uruguay from 1973 to 1985, which, as in other Latin American countries, imprisoned, tortured and murdered thousands of people who campaigned for more social justice and civil liberties. After the Tupamaros guerrilla movement was crushed, nine Tupamaros prisoners were subjected to a form of torture in various barracks across the country in a military operation that lasted twelve years and was intended to break their psychological resistance and drive them insane. They are isolated in tiny cells for over a decade, where they spend most of their time hooded, shackled and in silence. This „night of 12 years“ pushes them to their ultimate limits, but the film tells the story of how they still managed to avoid humiliation and survive.

Notes:

*Students, trainees, pupils, pensioners, severely disabled people (degree of disability of at least 50) and people who receive unemployment benefit, social assistance, basic income support or benefits under the Asylum Seekers Benefits Act (Asylbewerberleistungsgesetz) are entitled to reduced admission on presentation of the relevant certificate.

**Soli-price: If you would like to pay a little more, you can choose the soli-price and thus help to finance admission for those who have less money at their disposal. If you would like to make use of the solidarity fund, please contact us at the event or in advance.