Gran Chaco Artists

Less well-known than its neighbour, Amazonia, the forest in the Paraguayan Gran Chaco is undergoing the highest rate of deforestation in the world, which also poses a major threat to the people who live there, and their cultures. The Guarani and Nivaclé communities, to which these artists belong, are only two of the nineteen native communities of Paraguay. They live in the heart of this forest, on the outskirts of tiny local towns, in a state of total precarity.

In an effort to denounce the destruction of their environment, the artists of Gran Chaco have created drawings representing the diversity of the flora and fauna that fill their forest. It is the natural habitat of many animals such as the jaguar, peccary and the heron, and the ancestral source of subsistence of all the peoples that inhabit it. The gathering of Strombocarpa pods, the harvesting of honey from the Palo Borracho (a bottle-shaped tree native to the region), and the hunt are some of the themes that can be found in their works. The balance of this cohabitation is intrinsic to the survival of the Nivaclé and Guarani peoples, and also plays a key role in the structure of the Mennonite communities that have settled in the area, and today, it is under serious threat.

The works of the artists of the Gran Chaco have been shown at the Fondation Cartier since 2014, in the anniversary exhibition Mémoires Vives, and in 2019 in the exhibition Nous les Arbres , and also in 2021 at the Power Station of Art (Contemporary Art Museum of Shanghai) in the exhibition Trees. Their works were also presented at Lille in 2022 in the exhibition Les Vivants as well as Siamo Foresta at the Milan Triennale in 2023.