Return of the Maya; Thomas Hoepker

After five hundred years of colonial suppression and a brutal civil war, the May in Guatemala finally have a chance to live in peace. Latin America's longest civil war ended on December r29, 1996, with a peace accord between the conservative government of President Arzu and the Marxist guerilla group URNG. According the official estimates, 150,000 people were killed in the thirty-six-year war and another 50,000 are still missing. Most of the victims were Maya, who were brutally oppressed by both sides involved in the conflict.

Now the Maya are searching the killing fields for their dead, rediscovering their own magnificent culture and history, and are finally free to practice their ancient religion at remote altars on mountaintops, in caves and ravines, or near waterfalls, and to begin to heal their souls. Magnum Photographer Thomas Hoepker has visited Guatemala six times since 1991. He has captured many aspects of this remarkable period of transition in an array of astonishing photographs that will disturb, enchant and amaze