Cochihza

The volcano Concepción looms over the island of Ometepe in Lake Nicaragua. Like a sleeping but threatening guardian, it watches over the suspended time in which the people of the island live. Life passes slowly here, awaiting the ceremonies that break the tranquillity of the place. Into these magnificently framed landscapes fall the gestures and words of men…“In the language of the ancestors, many words are derived from the root ‘cochi’—to sleep. This expresses sleep as much as it expresses dreams, stretching, relaxing, the evening meal, subsistence, the cocoon made by caterpillars, eyelashes, going, leaving, yawning, making love to a woman, sleeping next to her, the place where one sleeps, waking up, pretending to sleep … The landscape of the island of Ometepe is like a sleeping body. The Elders describe life in two movements: a linear movement, like walking; and a beat emitted from a centre. At the moment of his birth, each man takes on a rhythm that is specific to him and that he will keep all his life. The history of a world, the relationship to a place, appear through this encounter with the community of the volcano and the guardians of its memory.” (Christine Gillard)

Luciano Barisone