The Earth’s creative energy is also the creative energy of humankind. We share with other worlds beyond humanity this capacity to create, to shape worlds, to make worlds bound to the terrestrial and the cosmic, rooted in relational quests pregnant with ritual gestures, where the earth, the waters, the glaciers, the plants speak and remember. We know that this bond is subtle and fragile, that it is in increasing danger, and that as long as we are able to respond with our songs and adornments, we and the Earth will continue to sustain each other.

WORLD MAKERS celebrates the voices and gestures that emerge from the Aconcagua or Akunkawa River basin, which recognize each other as participants in the making of human worlds and river worlds, among many other worlds yet to be named. The artistic and activist practices present in this hydrosocial territory are worldmakers, magical practices that bring to light voices rendered invisible in places sadly damaged by a universal vision (a single world). This anthropocentric gaze reduces us and reproduces colonial power relations, seriously threatening the continuity of life in all its forms. The Aconcagua River is born from the confluence of the Juncal and Blanco rivers—whose waters originate from high Andean glaciers such as the Juncal Glacier—and flows for more than one hundred kilometers to the Pacific Ocean, nourishing along its course a complex web of beings and life forms. It is the main body of water that supplies the Valparaíso region and population; For decades, it has been subjected to enormous pressure from extractive activities such as large-scale mining, aggregate extraction, and agribusiness, which, combined with the current climate crisis, have deteriorated its ecosystem balance and transformed its landscapes. This basin is the vital matrix of a unique biocultural network—inhabited by cultures whose knowledge remains with us—where rivers are beings whose world we share, humans and non-humans alike, and around whom we gather, organize, and celebrate.

Collective actions of protection and care throughout this territory underscore the urgent need to listen to these worlds, forging paths of resistance and re-existence through shared practices. Here, the pink quisquito of the coimas, the Miersia putaendensis, the Ivania juncalensis, the Juncal Glacier, the fío, the pilpilén, the Chilean palm, the Andean cat, wetlands, estuaries, and animals are defenders of the watershed and co-creators of these practices. We choose to live together, to dedicate our gratitude and creative energy to renewing alliances, because the call is to co-inhabit the Earth alongside all the other beings who transform and inherit it. This exhibition celebrates that life force that is nourished and inspired by respect, affection, and care for our interconnected worlds.