Williche Mapuche artist who lives and works in Valdivia, Chile. She is a writer, visual artist, performer and communications manager at Galería Barrios Bajos. Her work focuses on a contemporary perspective of the Mapuche being, expanding into global languages. She has written the books “Factory” (2016) and “La Edad de los Árboles” (2017). She won the 2017 Art and Culture Award for the Lagos Region (Region of the Lakes) and received the First Honorable Mention in Public Art at the 24th Municipal Young Art Award. Her work has been exhibited internationally, fusing pop culture and mass production.

Valdivia is a city in the south of Chile, famous for its environmental diversity, Mapuche history and the dispossession carried out by the Spanish and German colonization. Founded in 1552, it is surrounded by rivers and forests. Niebla, the sector where I live, a neo-rural space near the city, stands out for its beaches and the presence of monocultures around it that extract water from the territory. Its surroundings combine sea and rivers, offering impressive views and historical-eco tourism. However, the water shortage throughout the territory is a cause for concern for the population that lives there.

The word “abolengo” refers to an illustrious ancestry. It is also a brand of napkins in Chile produced by CMPC, a lumber company owned by a Chilean European-settler family of “illustrious ancestry.” CMPC plants and harvests eucalyptus and radiata pine trees in monoculture, using them as raw material to produce paper and other wood-based products. CMPC’s constant extractive activity over the past fifty years has resulted in the continued destruction of Mapuche lands.

The multimedia installation was created at the Palmer Gallery at Vassar College, New York. It juxtaposes paper boat sculptures made from “Abolengo” napkins depicting Columbus’s 1492 ships (the Niña, the Pinta, and the Santa María) with looped recordings of advertisements for “Abolengo” napkins, part of Chilean national collective memory and the original material produced for this exhibition. The original video portrays a paradoxical home-landscape, illustrating the complexities of living on invaded lands and the life force that persists and regenerates. The installation connects colonization, consumption, and Indigenous territorial autonomy, redefining the word “abolengo.”