We are the Aymara Indigenous Women Artisan Association of the Commune of Colchane Aymar Warmi, which was created in the year 2000 seeking to organize the different artisan associations that were in the commune, to empower ourselves and make us known. In these more than 20 years on the road, we have made progress in different areas of what an organization is, crafts and their commercialization, leading to strengthening our group and seeking to modernize ourselves, even though we are getting older. We are more than 20 Aymara women who come together around textile crafts and natural dyes, the collection of altiplanic herbs for medicinal use, and the production of quinoa.
Our knowledge as an Aymara (aymar) woman (warmi) has been inherited from our mothers, aunts and grandmothers, who, in turn, received this knowledge from many generations before, representing in our crafts what it is to be Aymara and the experience in our highlands. That is why our textiles are based on alpaca fiber, from animals that we ourselves graze, making an artisan process from the care of the animals to the final finishes of the fabric.
The Colchane commune is in the interior of the Tarapacá region, above 3,800 meters above sea level. This territory is our cradle and that of our art, which is colored pink, yellow and green with the quinoa that grows on the hills; of orange, purple, and blue tones of the sunsets; and from black to white of the skies at dawn.
These lands have taught us to raise our animals, which continue to be grazed as our grandmothers and grandmothers told us, who also showed us how to care for the bofedales that feed them, collect herbs and use them as medicine. For thousands of years these practices have maintained these fragile spaces, which is why we continue to do so, creating and collecting products in a sustainable way, with traditional knowledge and reflecting the worldview of our people.
MISSION
To be a benchmark in terms of the sale of Aymara products, through their commercialization, working in the productive fields of Aymara textiles, the collection of altiplanic herbs for medicinal use and the artisanal production of quinoa.
To be an important group in the maintenance of the Aymara culture, being recognized as the guardians of our Andean worldview.
VISION
To be a reference group for traditional Aymara culture, empowering the women of Colchane and making the Aymara culture known to all of Chile through its products and trades, for its appreciation at the national level and thus allow its local reproduction to the new generations.