The Orinoco river runs through the Venezuelan Amazon. It is the third largest river in the world, by water volume, and is invaluable in cultural significance, biodiversity and the variety of habitats: forests, plains, wetlands. It brings freshwater, clean air and arable land and runs through territories of vast reserves of gold, mercury, rare earths, oil, gas, and almost every other mineral or scarce resource known to man. The Orinoco River is an ecosystem driver, adverse effects on the Orinoco impact populations on a vast scale – on a planetary scale. 

The Orinoco is currently experiencing a complex set of economic, political, legal and illegal pressures, which are leading to increasing pollution of the river, mercury contamination, oil pills in the river’s delta, deforestation and irreversible damage to the surrounding natural environment and indigenous populations. There is little work being done to map and visualize what is going on, and it is a matter of urgency to draw attention to these issues. 

Building on the work of our 2020 Sol y Sombra Summer Course , we will use collective research and mapping to bring information together in an innovative way, to point out conflicts of interest and symbiotic relationships, in order to gain a deeper understanding of what is really happening in one of the most precious natural environments on our planet. We will chart the dangers the Orinoco and its inhabitants are facing and model how we might balance these out.

Invited Experts

Ricardo Avella, Urbanist & researcher, Amazon ecologies
Ethel Baraona, Critic, writer and curator / dpr-barcelona
Fabio Capra Ribeiro, PhD in Urbanism IUAV Venice / spatial & environmental justice
Juan Cristóbal Castro, Pontifical Catholic University of Valparaiso / extractivism as cultural phenomenon
Ana Maria Duran Calisto, Theorist and Doctoral Candidate UCLA / Yale School of Architecture
Eduardo Kairuz, Director, Global Extraction Observatory (GEO); Lecturer, Monash University
Liana Malva, Artist, musician, singer / Nature activism
Carmen Mendoza Arroyo, PhD in Urbanism, Assistant Director School of Architecture / UIC Barcelona
Franco Micucci, Head of the Department of Design & Architecture / Simón Bolívar University, Caracas
Karla Montauti, architect, artist, educator / Buenos Aires University
Eduardo Mouhtar, architect / Orinoco territorial researcher
Maria Isabel Pena, Architect, Former Director Instituto de Urbanismo / Central University of Venezuela
Jorge Perez Jaramillo, Senior Consultant to the World Bank, Former Head of Planning, Medellin
Nicolas Valencia, writer and thinker, editor and data manager of ArchDaily platform
Luis Romero, Artist / Contemporary Art Curator. Sheroanawe Hakihiiwe: arte y contexto. Alto Orinoco
Cristina Vollmer de Burelli, Founder, SOS Orinoco / Founding Co-Chair, The Global Leaders Program / Founding Executive Director V5 Initiative

Our Partners:

Department of Urban Planning, Central University of Venezuela (FAU UCV)
Department of Urban Planning, Simon Bolivar University
Fundación Espacio, Venezuela