GEOMETRIC FORESTS: STRUGGLES ON MAPUCHE LAND

  • GEOMETRIC FORESTS: STRUGGLES ON MAPUCHE LAND The temperate rainforests of Araucania in southern Chile have gradually been replaced by monocultures...

    GEOMETRIC FORESTS: STRUGGLES ON MAPUCHE LAND

     

    The temperate rainforests of Araucania in southern Chile have gradually been replaced by monocultures of pine and eucalyptus from massive cloning in order to develop the paper pulp industry. The Mapuche (“people of the earth”) lived there long before the country was founded. Today, they are fighting to save biodiversity, especially medicinal plants. Meanwhile, the exploitation and trafficking of resources are fueling violence between nationalist organizations, industrialists’ private militias and the army’s special anti-terrorist forces. Two worldviews are clashing. One is based on free-market economics, the other considers the relationship to the environment a spiritual one. The photographic inquiry of Ritual Inhabitual also reveals the ecological and political consequences of monoculture forestry, opening a debate on our consumption.
    With the support of Ministry of Cultures, Arts and Heritage of Chile and the DIRAC - Division of Cultures, Arts, Heritage, and Diplomacy of the Foreign Affairs Ministry of Chile. 
  • CURATOR: Sergio Valenzuela Escobedo Born 1983 in Santiago, Chile. Lives and works between Arles, France, and London, United Kingdom. Artist,...

    Portrait Sergio Valenzuela Escobedo © Nicola Noemi

    CURATOR: Sergio Valenzuela Escobedo 

    Born 1983 in Santiago, Chile.
    Lives and works between Arles, France, and London, United Kingdom.
     
    Artist, researcher, and publisher Sergio Valenzuela Escobedo holds a PhD in Photography from the École Nationale Supérieure de la Photographie in Arles. After a year at the National School of the Arts in Johannesburg (NSA), he earned a photography degree in Chile and completed his MFA at the Villa Arson in Nice. He has curated the exhibitions Mapuche at the Musée de l’Homme in Paris and Monsanto: A Photographic Investigation at the Rencontres d’Arles. He has been invited to teach at various schools and institutions, including Parsons Paris, ISSP and Atelier Noua. He also collaborated in 1000 Words and cofounded Double Dummy, a platform for critical reflection about documentary photography.
  • Ritual Inhabitual ARTIST: Tito González García Born 1977 in Clamart, France. Lives and works in Paris, France. ARTIST: Florencia Grisanti...

    Portrait of Ritual Inhabitual © Ritual Inhabitual

    Ritual Inhabitual

     

    ARTIST: Tito González García

    Born 1977 in Clamart, France. Lives and works in Paris, France.

     

    ARTIST: Florencia Grisanti

    Born 1983 in Santiago, Chile. Lives and works in Paris, France.

     

    Tito González García and Florencia Grisanti founded the Ritual Inhabitual Collective in 2013. Using different formats and media, their work reflects on the place of ritual in the world today. In their narratives, they create new ways of representing nature that become language and terrain for human communities facing environmental conflicts. Their work has been acquired by the Fonds d’Art Contemporain, Seine-Saint-Denis, France, Fondation Rothschild, Switzerland, and private collections in South America. In 2021, they were finalists for the Luma Rencontres Dummy Book Award.

  • Ritual Inhabitual. Geometric Forests series, Chile, 2018. Courtesy of the artists.

  • Ritual Inhabitual. Biotechnology series, Chile, 2019. Courtesy of the artists.

  • Ritual Inhabitual. Biotechnology series, Chile, 2019. Courtesy of the artists.

  • Ritual Inhabitual. Paul Filutraru, Rapper in the group Wechekeche ñi Trawün, Santiago de Chile, 2016. Courtesy of the artists.

  • Ritual Inhabitual. Foki kochkilla (Lapageria Rosea Ruiz & Pav). Courtesy of Muséum national d’histoire naturelle (Paris) and the artists.