#artoffline

According to estimates around 200,000 people lost their lives in the 50-year Colombian civil war. Another 25,000 were kidnapped, many are still considered missing. When the peace deal between the government and the FARC rebels was made in November 2016, guns were banned from the conflict. But the country's population have since faced the almost impossible task of having to agree on a common past. "The Shape of Now" illuminates this strenuous process and thus Colombia's leaden present from very different perspectives.

Ask seven people and you will hear seven different stories. The Shape of Now is a creative documentary that seeks to present the difficulties of writing history in order to achieve peace and reconciliation. This documentary portrays the lived experiences of different social spheres invested peacekeeping: While scientists, academics and activists attempt to find possible routes to normalize a war-torn society, a group of elderly mothers find a direct way to approach the possible killers of their disappeared children, forging a necessary and genuine encounter in the attempt to find closure.

Three relatives of missing people travel a long and complex path in search of the remains of their loved ones, facing bureaucratic, legal and social processes that have persisted since the Civil War. Atlas of disappearance reconstructs what oblivion and repression tried to hide. Through digital maps, archives and forensic architecture, the film illuminates the silent transfer of thousands of missing people to the Cuelgamuros Valley during the Franco dictatorship. Between absences and silences, the film shows the constant struggle to recover the truth, giving name and place to those who were torn from history.