CULTURAL TRAS LA HUELLA (Colombia)

We have joined forces with the Colombian-based non-governmental organization Cultural Tras La Huella, focused on promoting cultural education, strengthening artistic processes, and traditional/indigenous knowledge among native, rural and urban peoples for social development. We hope to support their ongoing film projects and assist in the translation of those projects, bringing the ancestral wisdom of the Americas to a larger audience.

We have successfully raised funds for post-production (professional color and sound editing) for the powerful documentary Kumanday: Way of the People. We have also been able to assist with the English subtitles. Kumanday is now on it’s way to being shared with Spanish and English-speaking audiences across the globe.

In a current social context where indigenous people face an irrepressible modernity, that endangers ancestral memory and the global environment, this documentary portrays an unprecedented meeting of 6 indigenous Colombian communities, who, despite all of the adversity, have initiated an intercultural exchange through a formal mutual agreement. They have formed the Council of Ancestral Spiritual Authorities of Colombia (CAAENOCANM). These communities are now working together to preserve and strengthen native language, cosmology and ancestral traditions, and in doing so, they offer wisdom and inspiration to the world.

CAAENOCANM was formed in 2016. In 2017, the Chilean filmmaker Jordi Goya (co-founder of CTH) joined the cause as a volunteer, registering and documenting the processes and agreements made by the council of elders. Together with indigenous healer Xochi Bucuru (director of CTH), guided closely by some of the council's elders, including Arhuaco elder Mamo Lorenzo Izquierdo, Misak elder Ignacio Morales, Sikuani elder Clemente Gaitan and Pasto elder Ramiro Estacio, they came up with the idea for this documentary, a film that could share and make visible the purpose of the council, as well as facilitate interaction between the elders and their communities (amidst the very difficult financial and social conditions in which Colombia finds itself currently).