2007

Commissioned by 6 Bienal do Mercosul, Porto Alegre, Brazil. Curated by Gabriel Pérez-Barreiro and Ticio Escobar.

At the edges of the Iguacu Falls tourist zone, which is shared by Argentina, Paraguay and Brazil, there is a small village of 54 families (354 inhabitants) called Yryapu. The people belong to the nation of Mb’ya Guarani. Their main livelihood is making traditional craft souvenirs - wooden sculptures and baskets - which they sell to tourists at the Iguacu Falls, or to souvenir shops in the nearest Argentinian town, Puerto Yguazu.

I started the Maramo Trade Post project as a site for communication and exchange, inspired by living in the Tres Fronteras area with its cross-border attitudes to commercial, linguistic and cultural developments. I took intensive Guarani lessons in Paraguay, lived and worked in Brazil, and settled in Argentina to open Maramo Trade Post at the Guarani village of Yryapu. I traded drawings for basket-weaving lessons and learned how to carve animalitos - the little wooden figures the Guarani used to carry as hunting amulets and now sell as souvenirs to tourists.

Today Guarani people sustain themselves not by hunting, but by making and selling their baskets and animalitos. Traditional crafts are functioning as an art of extreme necessity. They allow the Guarani not only to physically survive, but to still work with and own the symbols of their own culture.

Materials & Actions: Apprenticeship in carving wood figurines and weaving baskets in Guarani village of Yryapu, Guarani language lessons, traditional Guarani house built inside an industrial harbor warehouse in Porto Alegre, Brazil.

Location: Tres Fronteras region of Argentina, Paraguay and Brazil.