Forests are composed not just of plants, but of soils, waters, rocks, minerals, animals, sounds, colors, and flavors, as well as the human beings who live there. Human inhabitants imbue these forests with symbolic meaning and make practical use of the resources they offer, and in the process shape their very essence. 
  

This series of drawings depicts the continuous transformations and changing relationships of a single tree. It receives and feeds visitors, as its leaves and fruits nourish both animals and the earth alike; it provides a home for birds and shade for beings on the ground. Notice the different colors and textures it wears depending on the light, seasons, and time of day or night. 
  

These four serpentine votive figures, with whiskers and small front legs, likely represent a species of river catfish known as the capitán de la sabana. Similar creatures encircle these bowls, together evoking a watery landscape of lagoons such as those found in the páramos (high altitude moorlands found only in the American tropics). 
  

Calabashes and gourds are natural, waterproof containers that grow in many different sizes and shapes, and have been used extensively throughout the Americas. Traditional Colombian poporos (containers for lime powder for coca-chewing) are often made of calabashes (bottle gourds). These were greatly valued, and were often replicated in ceramic and tumbaga (gold-copper alloy).

“Plants and animals make music,” observes Diomedes Izquierda Mesía, an Arhuaco elder. “When it rains, or when there is wind, the plants are making music. Birds also have fiestas, they make music. The river makes music, too.” This music accompanies, celebrates, and helps to sustain all of life. 
  

Colombia is home to more than 1900 species of birds—the most of any country, and comprising approximately twenty percent of all bird diversity worldwide. Birds have social lives that are revealed in ancient artworks and in the mythology of contemporary Indigenous Colombian cultures. 
  

Colombia has the highest number of terrestrial mammal species of any country in the world—more than 450. Some of the most common are anteaters, sloths, tapirs, spectacled bears, deer, capybaras, pumas, jaguar, and several monkey species. 
  

Lobsters with human faces, as seen here, seem to reveal the internal personhood of these creatures. This notion of an essentially human essence within every living being is what makes communication and transformation between all beings possible. As Arhuaco elder Jaison Pérez Villafaña observes, “Until we know the pain and joy of other beings, we cannot understand them.

In the words of Arhuaco elder Jaison Pérez Villafaña, “My spirit travels, but it also has a home; my body.” 
  

Each item shown here features four monkeys surrounding geometric shapes in sets of three. A myth told by the Miraña people suggests that this may represent the Orion constellation, which is identified by its trapezoid of four main stars and three aligned stars in the middle forming the “belt” (pictured below). As the myth recounts: