Carahuata - The Fiber of Life
in the Paraguayan Chaco, the largest dry forest on Earth, the Ayoreo have long maintained deep relationships with the forest and its ecosystems. While many Ayoreo communities were forcibly contacted during the twentieth century, several groups continue to live in voluntary isolation within the remaining forest territories.Today, the Chaco is undergoing rapid transformation due to expanding cattle ranching, agribusiness development, and infrastructure projects. As forests disappear, encounters between isolated groups and the outside world become more frequent, increasing risks for communities that have chosen to remain in isolation.
Gran Chaco
Through Ayoreo textiles, film, photography, and installations, audiences are transported beyond the cartographic map to the heart of the Paraguayan Chaco — the largest dry forest on Earth and one of the most threatened ecosystems on the planet.
Intensive livestock farming, large infrastructure projects, agribusiness expansion, and increasing mining and hydrocarbon exploration are rapidly transforming the region, often ignoring the presence and rights of the Ayoreo people.
With the colonization of their territory in the northern Chaco during the mid-20th century, many Ayoreo who were forcibly contacted were displaced and settled in small communities. Much of their ancestral land was taken and sold to cattle ranchers.
Today, the territories formally recognized as belonging to the Ayoreo represent only 2% of their traditional lands.
Despite these pressures, several Ayoreo groups continue to live in voluntary isolation. They represent the last known uncontacted Indigenous peoples in the Gran Chaco and the only registered groups living in isolation outside the Amazon and the Cerrado in Latin America.