Ausentes presentes: Art Music from the Chilean Exile in the Anacrusa Festivals at the Goethe-Institute Santiago (1985-89)

Abstract

Created in 1984, the Anacrusa Music Association organized concerts, workshops, and festivals of contemporary music in Chile during the last years of Pinochet's military dictatorship. Crucial for these events was the collaboration with the Goethe-Institute Santiago, which enabled a space for free expression within the repressive context of the dictatorship. This article explores the circulation and reception of musical works by Chilean composers living in exile performed in the 1985, 1987, and 1989 Anacrusa festivals. The trajectories of the pieces by three main figures of the politically engaged avant-garde of the 1960s - Gustavo Becerra-Schmidt, Sergio Ortega, and Fernando Garciá - can be seen as a transfer process that involved the goals of West German cultural diplomacy in Chile, as well as the interaction between Anacrusa organizers, Latin American colleagues, and performers who returned from exile.