Discover El Salado

El Salado can be viewed from different perspectives through music, communication and remembrance. If you choose a destination for its culture and history as well, you will encounter three distinct connections here: the work of a music group, an alternative communications collective, and a memorial to the victims of the massacre. They represent different forms of expression and commemoration.

Music and Dance

A 2020 community profile describes the Corporación de Música de El Salado as a group of children, girls and young people devoted to music and dance. In the same context, Cumbia, Bullerengue, Puya, Porro and Fandango are named as rhythms featured in their work. The connection between music and dance is the main theme; the five rhythms give more detail about the group’s musical focus. For your understanding of the place, this is an artistic connection distinct from the historical commemoration at the memorial.

Communication and Remembrance

El Salado’s communications collective, Coco-Salado, began as an alternative communications project. Its young members aim to strengthen the individual and collective memory of the residents. This refers to two levels: the memories of individuals and the shared remembrance of the residents. One approach is to train rural communicators. At the same time, the members want to contribute to the development of their community through photography, video, radio and writing. These media offer different forms of expression: photography and video work with images, while radio and writing do so in other ways. Together with training rural communicators, both forms of communication and an educational approach are part of the collective’s profile. This distinguishes its work from the musical work of the Corporación: Coco-Salado focuses on communication, remembrance and development.

Commemoration and Local History

The memorial to the victims of the El Salado massacre is part of the historical commemoration. It was built in 2005 under the care of Father Rafael Castillo, who was the parish priest of El Carmen de Bolívar at the time. The memorial is near the church. From February 16 to 21, 2000, 450 paramilitaries committed the massacre, in which 60 people were killed. This was followed by a period when El Salado was uninhabited. The timeline clearly separates the event from its later commemoration: the memorial was created five years after the massacre. If you are planning to visit the memorial, it is advisable to check in advance whether visits are possible.

Different Perspectives

For your understanding, these themes are not interchangeable: the Corporación represents music and dance, Coco-Salado represents communications work related to remembrance and development, and the memorial commemorates the victims. In this way, artistic work and historical remembrance can be understood as different facets of El Salado.

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For the broader travel overview: Bolívar.