Tratamiento simbólico contemporáneo del vínculo ancestral entre los ecuatorianos y el maíz para su recuperación y dignificación social

Abstract

The expansion of monocultures and industrial agriculture is generating serious socioenvironmental impacts. This promotes a distancing between humans and nature, which affects the cultural relationship with ancestral crops such as corn: vital in the diet and identity of Ecuadorians. Faced with this problem, we set out to contribute to the recovery of the ancestral bond between Ecuadorians and corn, through its symbolic dignity in a contemporary visual artistic proposal. With this purpose, Crianza del maíz is produced, in the form of a participatory installation, divided into four high beds arranged in a triangular shape, which coincide with the cardinal points: south, east, north and west. Raised beds represent an agroecological technique that regenerates the soil and allows cultivation without invading or disturbing the land. Once the community was called, it was possible to fill these beds with organic materials, black earth and compost; to later assume the collective sowing of corn seeds; and participate together in a coexistence that leads to understanding corn as not only material but also spiritual food for Ecuadorians. The stages were documented through photographs, as evidence of the relational process vital to an exciting, inspiring, and educational aesthetic experience, which favored moments of reconnection between humanland, human-corn, human-culture, and the socialization of knowledge of practical use, in addition symbolic.