Waterweavers
The River in Contemporary Colombian Visual and Material Culture. Art Museum of the Americas, Washington, 2015. Curator: José Roca, with Alejandro Martín.
For an optimal view of our website, please rotate your tablet horizontally.
Foreground:
Jorge Lizarazo / Hechizoo:
Walking Jade area rug. 2013
Inga. 2013
Wouna and Woun. 2013
Stools
Background, center:
Carol Young:
Memoria (Memory), 2014
Background, right:
Nicolás Consuegra:
El agua que tocas es la última que ha pasado y la primera que viene (The water that you touch is the last of what has passed and the first of that which comes). 2013
Exhibition view of Waterweavers: The River in Contemporary Colombian Visual and Material Culture.
Jorge Lizarazo, who founded the workshop Hechizoo in Bogotá in 2000, seeks to reinterpret indigenous Colombian weaving methods, materials, and techniques. Lizarazo has established himself as one of the foremost creators of contemporary textiles, deftly incorporating tradition and modernity into his work. The installation consists of textiles, rugs, and a freestanding rubber and copper tree, along with a canoe from the Putumayo region that hangs from the ceiling and is clad with glass beads.
Normally used by the Inga people of the Putumayo region to create necklaces and bracelets, the beads were composed in traditional patterns representing water, sky, and animals by Inga artisans working in the Hechizoo workshop. On the opposite wall is Carol Young’s installation Memoria (Memory, 2014). Made with ceramic sheets that have been rolled and stacked, this work highlights the way in which earth, in this case alluvial deposits, can act as a repository of memory. Young’s installation is at the same time a territory, a river, and a library in which time is encapsulated and knowledge is stored.
Linking these two works is Nicolás Consuegra’s video installation El agua que tocas es la última que ha pasado y la primera que viene (The water that you touch is the last of what has passed and the first of that which comes, 2013), which the artist conceived as a contemporary version of the panorama—a pre-cinematic device designed to provide an expansive view of a given landscape. In his work, vignettes taken in different places and times of day in the town of Honda—once the main port on the Magdalena River and currently a downtrodden community where poverty, unemployment, and environmental deterioration prevail—are connected by an impassive river that is indifferent to the miseries it links. This epic tale of one of the most historically important rivers in Colombia is recounted through mute images of idleness and despair.
© Photo: Bruce White
Courtesy of Bard Graduate Center Gallery
The River in Contemporary Colombian Visual and Material Culture. Art Museum of the Americas, Washington, 2015. Curator: José Roca, with Alejandro Martín.