Colombian Style

The Wayúu town:

The Wayúu live in a region in Colombia called La Guajira. It’s a region situated at the frontier between the Colombia and Venezuela.

Woman of La Guajira are know as guajiras. They learned to fabric the Mochilas or ‘knapsacks’ during the “bleaching”. This period stars at puberty, when the guajiras can only be around their families, which at the time to teach them how to do the labors of the house, to knit, to spin, to behave as a real Wayúu woman.

Each mochila or knapsacks are carry out by one single woman, who makes it their own design. It takes approximated 20 days to make a single Mochila.  This Mochilas are maybe the most acknowledged and representative knits of the Wayúus. The grate variety of geometric motives, florally and Kannas which decorate with a mix of colors that are unmistakable.

To knit in the indigene community of the Wayúu, is much more than a cultural activity or an inheritance of their ancestors. To knit means to show through out their creativity, intelligence and wisdom as thy feel it.

The Wayúu is the largest ethnic group in Colombia, an indigenous community that inhabits La Guajira peninsula, at the Caribbean coast. The Wayúu are a people of the desert, of sun and wind who have survived for centuries in this dry and inhospitable region.

One of their most traditional activities is weaving, a task which is a part of their cultural identity and an inheritance from their ancestors.

Mochilas (knapsacks) are closely related with the Wayúu’s form of life as weaving is an art to express, a symbol of creativity and wisdom.

Their pieces are characterized by the representation of beautiful shapes that symbolize elements of nature (animals, plants, paths etc… or abstract shapes). The traditional designs include flowers and geometric symbols using very strong colours. The more complex the shape, the piece becomes more valuable.

Wale’Keru, The spinning spider: Wayúu myth about the origins of weaving.

The Wayúu believe that weaving is an art they learnt from Wale’Keru. The legend says that Wale’Keru lost her mother when she was very young and unfortunately she was left in her father’s sisters’ care, who only treated her well when he was around. Like all Wayúu men, her father spent a lot of time outside home, and when young she was the object of mistreatment: during the day she worked at domestic tasks and at night she was forced to sleep in the ashes in the kitchen. One day, when he woked up, Wale’Keru’s father found a beautiful woven cloth beside his hammock. Wanting to give thanks, he asked who had made it and his sisters told him it had been them. After this, Wale’Keru’s father would find a new woven cloth every morning.

One night, wondering what his daughter did at night, he walked to the place where the girl would retire to at the end of each day, and he was deeply surprised to find that the mysterious and skillful weaver was his small daughter. A little before dawn, Wale’Keru’s father, who had hidden from his daughter, pained because of the lack of attention he had been giving her, decided to talk to her and ask for forgiveness, with the bad luck that, when seen, Wale’Keru turned into a spider and ran away from home forever.