Piedra de los Machines

Our artisan group is located in the rural settlement of Tasmag, municipality of Cumbal, department of Nariño. We are cumbaleños, from the grasslands, natives from this place as per our clothes, taitas (father figures or authority figures in indigenous tribes), and the territory. We carry the name of a sacred petroglyph, which is a very important part of our culture; the stone of machines (which is a volcanic stone engraved with monkey figures) engraved with an eight-point star known as the Sun of the Grasslands, and on the sides with monkeys and Chaman figures which speak of our cosmovision and indigenous tradition.

Machines Artisans

Ancestral knowledge of weave in guanga dates back to times when wool was tied from beams in the ceiling and was stretched by tying the threads around the weaver’s waste. Currently, with the support of chontas and comueles, we have been able to perfect this vertical weaving technique allowing us to express our symbology, keeping our history and our legacy alive. 

Guanga 

Pastos Animagraph

Piedra de los Machines - Animagraph

Pastos - Piedra de los Machines 

In our fabrics, we capture the thoughts that makes us one with this territory, with its rivers, stones and mountains. With the work done over the land and the writing on the fabrics, we become pastos and remember our ancestors who fought to recover their territory.

Live language 

Moors are a place where the spirits and the territory’s vital force are protected, where entities like elves and the Madre Monte inhabit. It is in moors where chagra is grown, and chagra means having everything, having health, wisdom, knowledge, and the abundance that exists herein. 

The chagra is the wisdom inherited from our ancestors, from where our food comes from and what allows us to connect with other villages through bartering. The diversity of products mixed in the chagrura envelop knowledge, sustenance, and unity.

Photo of the Cumbal Great Lake with the Cumbal volcano in the background. 



Artisans

Piedra de los Machines

CulturePastos

Culture
Pastos