Mexico City. The exhibition Daily life, the importance of Mexican agrobiodiversitywhich will open today at 12 noon in the Dahlia forum of the Botanical Garden of the Institute of Biology (IB) of the National Autonomous University of Mexico, shows those objects that at some point resolved people’s daily lives and that are now appreciated as crafts or decorative items.
On a guided tour to The Conference Among the more than 400 pieces in the exhibition, a standout is an Ixtle shirgo, a cape made with the leaves of a species called Yucca filifera; a mule suadero, a kind of protector for pack animals and a honey box, a container very different from current traditional hives.
Also on display are a coffee pulper, equipment, the chairs of indigenous emperors – shown in pre-Hispanic codices such as the Florentine and the Cruz Badiano – and fishermen’s traps with ingenious shapes.
Linda Balcázar Sol, exhibition coordinator at the UNAM IB Botanical Garden, assured that the purpose is to break with the idea that agrobiodiversity is chili, corn, beans, and pumpkin. Yes, the cornfield plays a very important role, but there is much more, because we dress, eat, make utensils, create tools and heal ourselves from agricultural diversity.
.
In Daily life…where nine botanical gardens in the country, the Mexican Association of Botanical Gardens, the Mexican Ethnobiological Association and Friends of the Botanical Garden participate, there is a section dedicated to jewelry in which necklaces of natural flowers that give off the smell of honey and the elaborate ones stand out. with palm woven in a complex way, as well as a collection of earrings with grains of different varieties of corn.
There is also basketry made with different plants, such as reeds and Dasylirium Sereke,which is difficult to work with. Highlights include huipils made with wild cotton or dyed with natural dyes, a sample of pumpkin seeds and a collection of medicinal plants.
Balcázar Sol said that although it seems that the exhibition has nothing to do with the care and conservation of the environment, In reality, it allows us to reflect on the use of natural resources and observe how people have used them to manufacture a wide variety of products, ranging from a bag to store coffee to a fine woven skirt.
.
The biologist mentioned that with the arrival of industrialization, many of the trees, plants, palms or seeds from which these items were made have been lost, and from there comes its relevance because those who visit us will be able to see elements that would be impossible to observe in another context, even if we lived in the communities where they originate.
.
He added that the assembly allows us to reflect on how “the use of natural elements from each region avoids industrialization, river pollution and excessive plastics.
The coordinator of the forum Dahlia believes that coming to the exhibition is establishing a connection with nature
The exhibition was set up with the participation of ethnobotanist Leonardo Beltrán Rodríguez and Salma Gómez Ibarra, from the educational area of the Institute of Biology.
#highlight #importance #objects #agricultural #diversity #everyday #life
– 2024-04-23 00:30:25
