Landscapes in Crisis: Representations of the Exploitation of Latin American Tropical Rainforests

This project is a digital exhibition created using Omeka, an open-source content management system for online digital collections. Built around the concept of the “crisis of the landscape,” its purpose is to creatively represent the exploitation of natural resources and indigenous populations in the Latin American tropical rainforests during the past one hundred and fifty years.

This virtual exhibition explores different visions of the exploitation of human and natural resources in Latin America’s tropical rainforests. It pays particular attention to deforestation and rubber extraction using different literary and iconographic works of the 19th and 20th centuries. Our project adopts literary critic Jens Andermann’s idea of a “Crisis of the Landscape” (2012). Our intent is to show how this concept is expressed in Latin American modernity and captured in various expressions of the region’s artistic works. The representation of the landscape becomes an expression of a crisis of political, economic, ecological, and cultural proportions in the use of natural resources, as well as the place that Latin America has had in global capitalism as a supplier of raw materials. The visual and literary sources used in this project include: Colombian José Eustasio Rivera’s novel, The Vortex; Venezuelan Rómulo Gallegos’ Canaima; and several short stories by Uruguayan Horacio Quiroga. These works register both the crisis of representation, as well as the resistance of the landscape and its native inhabitants.

Esta exposición explora diferentes visiones de la explotación de recursos humanos y naturales de regiones selváticas latinoamericanas a través de diferentes obras literarias e iconográficas de los siglos XIX y XX. Nuestro recorrido adopta la expresión de “paisaje-en-crisis” de Jens Andermann (2012) para exponer el enfrentamiento constante por recursos naturales —específicamente caucho y maderas— que tiene lugar en la selva latinoamericana y que es un reflejo de la lucha de supervivencia de la naturaleza en contra del afán de modernización del ser humano. Los textos y las imágenes seleccionadas buscan comparar formas de explotación de dichos recursos, así como también de campesinos y pueblos indígenas que trabajan y viven en la selva. Las fuentes usadas comprenden obras literarias como La Vorágine del colombiano José Eustasio Rivera, Canaima del venezolano Rómulo Gallegos y varios cuentos del uruguayo Horacio Quiroga, así como también diversos medios de expresión visual que ilustran la explotación de la selva en América Latina.