Re-trato de Familia brings together the lives of Hannah, Mario, Igal and Jaime — three generations that connect mother to son to grandsons — spanning the bridges of time and space. It all began …

Born in Guatemala in 1968, Jaime Permuth finished high school in Guatemala City, then earned a full scholarship and graduated from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem with a dual major, a bachelor of arts in psychology and English literature. From there, he was off to New York City where he completed a master of fine arts in photography degree from the School of Visual Arts.

One of the most important photographers in Guatemala and the first Japanese citizen to settle in the country was born on December 27, 1844 in Fujisawa, Japan. Kohe Yasu or Yasu Kohei, later became Juan José de Jesús Yas. In 1874 an important astronomical event impacted the life of Yas — the passage of Venus before the sun. Numerous foreign delegations traveled to Japan where they could observe the event with perfect clarity. The Mexican government, under President Sebastián Lerdo de Tejada, sent a scientific mission headed by an outstanding Mexican astronomer of the last century, Francisco Díaz Corvarrubias.