The mamo answered: “The dam is likeĪ knot in the veins. My first question was “What does the El Cercado dam represent for the people of the Sierra Nevada?”. I got out my video camera, adjusted the focus, the aperture of the lens, the shutter speed and the microphone, and when everything was ready, I began to record. In the shade of a tree in Görlitzer Park. The place we chose to conduct the interview was Pedro Juan does not speak Spanish and his interpreter, Santos, helped me with the interview. The Koguis and other indigenous groups who live there call it the “Heart of the World,” and it was seriously wounded by the building of the El Cercado multi-purpose dam on the Ranchería River, which began construction in 2006 and is still not finished. Good fortune to interview mamo Pedro Juan, the supreme spiritual leader of the Kogui ethnic group of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta -a mountain range which runs alongside the Caribbean coast of Colombia. ![]() In the European summer of 2013, I was on an artist’s residency in Berlin, where I had the Zoila cast the net at least 30 times, but only caught three fish that were 5 centimeters long. Its indigenous name- to fish with a net for the first time in my life. With Zoila I went to the Cuacua River -Suaza River being In all the environmental conflicts I have a close knowledge of, the rivers, mountains, animals, jungles and minerals are creatures which take an active role in the efforts of territorial resistance. Zoila Ninco, who explained to me that the Yuma had grown in that way because it knew that it would halt the building of the dam. In May 2012 I visited the area affected by the dam for the first time. That investigative article explained that, after its course was shifted, the Yuma River had grown: it had returned to its natural bed, eroded the deviation tunnel and halted the construction work. It proposes all this without taking into account that it is a vital transport waterway for more than 70% of Colombia’s population. El Quimbo is the second of the seventeen hydropower plants laid down in the “Master Plan for Exploiting the Magdalena River,” which aims to transform the river into a fluvial highway focused on the export of coal, petroleum and other minerals, as well as the generation of energy. The environmental license for the project was granted in 2008 and the dam began to generate electricity in 2015. El Quimbo is a dam built on the Yuma River -the indigenous name for the Magdalena River, Colombia’s main waterway- by the Endesa- Emgesa multinational conglomerate. I began to investigate the El Quimbo hydroelectric power project on the Magdalena River after reading the following headline in March 2012: “The River Refuses to Shift its Course”. The book is part of the ongoing body of work ‘Be Dammed’, that investigates the effects ofĮxtractivism on natural and social landscapes, exploring the power dynamics associated with the corporatization and decimation of water resources. Serpent River Book gathers visual and written materials compiled by the artist while working in Colombian, Brazilian, and Mexican communities affected by the industrialization and privatization of river systems. ![]() As a book it can be opened, pleated and read in many directions, and has a performatic potential to it, functioning as a score, or as a workshop tool. The fluctuating publication can frame many narratives. Serpent River Book is a 72 page accordion fold artist-book, that combines archival images, maps, poems, lyrics, satellite photos, with the artist’s own images and texts on river bio-cultural diversity, in a long and meandering collage. Artist Book, 72 page accordion fold, offset, printed canvas hardcover, elastic band
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