Art History
Monumental Mural Erased by Pinochet Reemerges in Chile After 50 Years
A long-lost artwork by Julio Escámez is being painstakingly recovered and restored in Chile's city hall.
A long-lost artwork by Julio Escámez is being painstakingly recovered and restored in Chile's city hall.
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Long-thought lost, a historic mural by Chilean artist Julio Escámez that was erased by Augusto Pinochet’s military regime in 1973, is finally reemerging in Chile’s city hall.
A team from the Heritage Unit of the Municipality of Chillán (UPA) is currently in its third phase of uncovering and restoring the celebrated mural in the Salon de Honor. Begun in 2021, the project involves the millimeter-by-millimeter removal of 12 layers of white paint, which were slathered over the original composition decades ago. The restoration is slated to be completed in December 2027.
“We will be working in grids, carrying out manual stripping daily,” Elvira Fuchslocher, head of the restoration team, said in a statement. “This is a very particular and unique case, as there are not many examples of murals of this caliber that have remained covered by so many layers of paint for so long.”
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The work by Escámez was commissioned in 1969 by Mayor Eduardo Contreras Mella on the eve of Salvador Allende‘s presidential election victory. Escámez spent two years creating the mural, which, when completed, spanned some 452 square feet across a wall of the Salon de Honor. Titled Beginning and End, it depicted the triumph of people over oppression, the sweeping composition animated by expressive figures and bursts of color.
In 1972, the mural was unveiled by Mayor Ricardo Lagos Reyes, Mella’s successor, before Allende visited the work himself months later. Nobel laureate Pablo Neruda described it as containing “the most extraordinary essences of creation have been recognized, essences that possess the stillness of depth, of truth.”
The ardently right-wing Pinochet, however, saw the artwork differently, linked as it is to a democratic socialist project. After his military junta overthrew Allende, the dictator ordered the mural destroyed. Escámez was forced into exile in Costa Rica, wounded by the erasure of his work. “What he felt about what happened to his mural encapsulated the pain he felt toward Chile,” Catalina Sverlij, his great-niece who heads up the Fundación Escámez, told El Pais.
Nearly five decades on, Chile’s current mayor, Camilo Benavente, spearheaded the effort to recover Escámez’s mural. But the chances were slim that the work still survived. Over the years, reports had circulated about how the artwork was destroyed: It was demolished with bayonets, it was covered with tar, or, in the artist’s own account, chipped away with “chisel and hammer.”
But in 2021, an initial analysis of the wall in the Salon de Honor by the University of the Arts found the first trace of Beginning and End. “We locked ourselves in the council chamber, and in a small window that opened [by removing the white paint], the orange color appeared, which is prominent in the mural and corresponds to the flame,” Karin Cárdenas, a historian who worked on this first analysis, told El Pais. “We stopped and said, ‘There might be something here.’”
Turns out, the mural had not been tarred or slashed with bayonets—it had simply been painted over. But as the UPA continued to uncover more of the artwork over the years, the team learned that its original height was reduced to make room for a second story, with a window cut directly through it.
They also discovered that the mural was larger than previously believed. In fact, the city now suspects the artwork’s title, Beginning and End, might refer to two artworks, likely Beginning and End. Where the first part portrays the dramatic class struggle, the second reveals a serene group of women peering through a telescope, reflecting “calm and contemplation,” said Cárdenas. Both murals were designated National Monuments in 2024.