Crafting Exile

In today’s episode, ‘Crafting Memories’, host Jasmine Gideon (Birkbeck, University of London) talks to siblings Myriam and Jimmy Bell, who arrived in the UK as exiles from Chile in the 1970s. Forced to travel without their parents while still teenagers, they reflect on arriving in London and navigating those early years of life in exile.

The conversation explores the transgenerational transmission of memories and how descendants of survivors of the dictatorship connect with past events in Chile. Myriam and Jimmy describe how their father, an artist and political prisoner, produced craftwork while incarcerated in concentration camps in Chile. When he was later exiled to the UK, he was able to bring some of this work with him. They reflect on the importance of this craftwork in keeping alive memories of the dictatorship’s impact on families, and on the role arts and craft can play not only within the family but also by telling a wider story the Chilean military regime.

In the final part of the episode, Myriam and Jimmy explain how they hope to build a legacy for the future by planting trees in Chile as a way of remembering all of ‘the Disappeared’.

Musical excerpts from the sound recording 'Nuevo Dia', taken from the album Desaparecido by Vladimir Vega and Friends, are used here with the kind permission of Vladimir Vega's estate.

You can watch the film that this podcast builds on Crafting Resistance: The Art of Chilean Political Prisoners on YouTube.

Mentioned resources:

For further details of the tree planting project in Chile discussed in the podcast: Ecomemoria – ECOMEMORIA

Figures cited at the start of the episode on the numbers of disappeared and exiled are taken from Angell, A., & Carstairs, S. (1987). The exile question in Chilean politics. Third World Quarterly, 9(1), 148-167.

Further suggested resources on the politics of craft and the relationship between craft and exile

Andrä, C., Bliesemann de Guevara, B., Cole, L., & House, D. (2020). Knowing Through Needlework: curating the difficult knowledge of conflict textiles. Critical Military Studies, 6(3-4), 341-359.

Adams, J. (2013). Exiles, art, and political activism: Fighting the Pinochet regime from afar. Journal of Refugee Studies, 26(3), 436-457.

Carrasco E, F. R., & Smith, R. G. (2025). The Role of Music in the UK’s Chile Solidarity Campaign and in Developing an Exile’s Sense of Self and Place: Francisco Carrasco, Musician, and Member of Merseyside’s Chilean Community. Bulletin of Hispanic Studies, 102(6), 571-582.

Gideon, J. (2024). Crafting arts-based stories of exile, resistance and trauma among Chileans in the UK. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 50(13), 3319-3337.

Gideon, J. (2018). Gendering activism, exile and wellbeing: Chilean exiles in the UK. Gender, Place & Culture, 25(2), 228-247.

Some more general resources on the Chilean exile experience and human rights in Chile.

Displaced Voices Special Issue Chile @ 50 – Living Refugee Archive

Fifty Years of Human Rights in Chile: Essays in Honour of Alan Angell | Springer Nature Link