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Today, we’re bringing you a special feed drop from ReCurrent, a podcast from the Getty that explores how art, history, and culture shape the world around us.
In this episode of ReCurrent, host Jaime Roque takes us back to 1980s Los Angeles, when civil wars in El Salvador, Guatemala, and Nicaragua sent hundreds of thousands of people north and helped turn LA into “Little Central America.” With professor and longtime participant Rubén Martínez as our guide—someone who lived through this moment firsthand—we follow the Sanctuary Movement as churches quietly, and then publicly, open their doors to refugees the U.S. refused to recognize. Sanctuary meant food and a place to sleep, but it also meant music, theater, poetry, and posters that challenged U.S. policy while helping people process their grief.
From there, we step inside Echo Park United Methodist Church, where artist and performer Elia Arce and a circle of Central American poets, musicians, and organizers transform the basement into a cultural home. We also sit with Rev. David Farley, pastor emeritus of Echo Park United Methodist, who was there to witness it all. Upstairs, families try to stay invisible on classroom floors; downstairs, performances inspired by banned writers, songs from back home, and handmade banners turn fear and exile into shared story.
Our last stop is the Getty Research Institute, where researcher Jasmine Magaña—a Salvadoran Angeleno herself—is helping build a new, expansive record of this era.
Learn more about the episode here: https://www.getty.edu/podcasts/recurrent/central-american-art-and-resistance-in-1980s-la/
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