Wiwa Cultural Heritage Project

Videography and producer

During my time in Colombia, I was invited to film the music and dance of the Wiwa Tribe.

Who are the Wiwa?

Rising approximately 5,000 meters out of Northern Colombia’s Caribbean shores, the misty, cloud-shrouded Sierra Nevada mountains have been the home to indigenous tribes for more than 2,000 years. As if unaffected by time, the Sierra’s indigenous tribes still live as their Tairona ancestors did centuries ago. Despite growing modernization and tourism in the area, the Wiwa community – the smallest of four tribes living in the Lost City today – show us how they strive to keep their ancient culture alive.

The Wiwa are direct descendants of the Tairona people (200 BCE), a great civilization whose impressive skills in architecture and gold work attracted the unwanted attention of Spanish colonists in the early 16th century. Despite an increase in contact with the outside world, the Wiwa community still rejects modern life. Instead, they choose to live as their ancestors did: off the land and dedicating their lives to connecting spiritually with it. With a population of around 7,000 people, they’re the smallest ethnic group living in the Sierra Nevada mountains today.

The project

The grandmother had a vision that it was time to create an archive of their cultural heritage for the future generation. Younger generations start to embrace modern technologies more and more and so they see a change in culture. An NGO originated in Finland has built a school in their community with tables and chairs and so there is less time to learn the dances from their ancestors. By building an online video archive they hope to sustain their culture and attract funds from musea to showcase their heritage. We filmed under hard conditions (humid and at night) but tried to make the best of it with flashlights and a lot of patience.