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Part III: Chile's Enduring Rifts

December 03, 2013 | The New Yorker
By
Jeff Kelly Lowenstein

A group of drag queens pose during the eighth-annual 2013 Open Mind Fest, in Santiago, on November 9. Organized by MOVILH (the Movement for Homosexual Integration and Liberation), the event took up four city blocks, with multiple stages for musical performances. The MOVILH spokesman Jaime Parada explained that the purpose of the event is, in part, to give greater visibility to the gay and lesbian community. Image by Jon Lowenstein/NOOR/Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting. Chile, 2013.

Two young women at the Open Mind Fest. The festival took place at Paseo Bulnes, near politicians’ offices and the Presidential palace. Parada explained that event organizers chose the location in part to send a message to politicians about the community’s voting clout. Five of the nine Presidential candidates attended the event. Image by Jon Lowenstein/NOOR/Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting. Chile, 2013.

A group of drag queens pose at the festival. Image by Jon Lowenstein/NOOR/Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting. Chile, 2013.

Volunteers for the nonprofit TECHO build a community center in a campamento (shantytown), in the La Florida neighborhood of Santiago, on November 9. Founded in 1997, the organization works to help individuals and communities overcome poverty. Image by Jon Lowenstein/NOOR/Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting. Chile, 2013.

TECHO volunteers. Image by Jon Lowenstein/NOOR/Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting. Chile, 2013.

A member of the carabineros speaks to reporters about a protest staged by members of ACES, a national group of secondary-school students who took over the headquarters of the Presidential frontrunner Michelle Bachelet on Election Day, November 17. Image by Jon Lowenstein/NOOR/Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting. Chile, 2013.

Members of ACES on Election Day. Isabel Salgado, a spokeswoman for the group, said that ACES seeks to transform the Chilean education system, wants greater community control, and does not trust the country's politicians and political parties. Image by Jon Lowenstein/NOOR/Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting. Chile, 2013.

A broadcast journalist reports on the ACES takeover of Bachelet’s headquarters. Image by Jon Lowenstein/NOOR/Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting. Chile, 2013.

Eloisa González, a 19-year-old spokesman for ACES, stands outside of the Bachelet headquarters on Election Day. "She represents the big businesses," González said of Bachelet. Image by Jon Lowenstein/NOOR/Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting. Chile, 2013.

Jaime Parada, a councilman in Santiago’s Providencia neighborhood, is Chile’s first openly gay public official. Parada, who is the son of staunch supporters of the former dictator Augusto Pinochet, was elected in 2012, in a politically conservative community. Image by Jon Lowenstein/NOOR/Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting. Chile, 2013.

For the past three weeks, The New Yorker photo department has followed the journey of the photographer Jon Lowenstein and the writer Jeff Kelly Lowenstein as they documented Chile’s 2013 Presidential elections and the 40th anniversary of Pinochet’s military coup. This week, the brothers turned their attention to Chilean youth, spending time with members of the nonprofit TECHO and with Jaime Parada, the first openly gay citizen elected to public office in Chile. Many young people recognize the suffocating effect that the Pinochet regime had on their society, and they are eager for change. As Jeff told us, “Many Chilean youth are committed to helping the country continue its arduous transition from a dictatorship to a vibrant democracy.”

View the first and second part of the “Enduring Rifts” series on Chile.