Pasto, Colombia 2021
Cultural Area Biblioteca Banco de la República, Regional Image 9
Video art / Black and white film
Duration: 1 minute 50 seconds
Link to watch video
Cultural Area Biblioteca Banco de la República, Regional Image 9
Video art / Black and white film
Duration: 1 minute 50 seconds
Link to watch video
The conceptual framework of this video art is to establish a meeting of perspectives on the ideal of development. Image and sound confront each other, as this panorama records a landscape of the Ecuadorian Amazon jungle (Upano River) that has been harmed by mining. The Shuar chant in the background, performed by Churubia, an indigenous leader based on cosmological knowledge, invokes Arutam (god who lives in the sacred Tuna waterfall). With this chant, the gods of water are asked for resistance and strength. In this way, political and power relations are established, as knowledge and wisdom manifest themselves differently.
While some people proceed under the notion of economic growth through the excessive exploitation of nature, other communities compose poems, songs, and mythologies as a means to transcend and preserve for future generations the legacy of a living nature treated through dialogue, care, and affection. It's as if mining or the construction of hydroelectric dams, besides being a means of obtaining economic gains, aims to control the quality of life and dominate the thoughts and time of others, as it encourages extreme consumerism and completely denies the value of the habitat, and that which truly doesn't need to be exploited or mutilated, offering a lifestyle that has managed to enslave and obscure the true ideals of human existence.
