In this photograph, the painting “La Ofrenda” is joined with a winged fish. This gold piece, now on display at the Gold Museum in Bogota, Colombia, was found in a tomb in the region of San Agustin. This gold jewelry was made by the inhabitants of the Andean mountains between 1 AD and 900 AD.
“La Ofrenda” is inspired by a goldsmith piece of the Muisca people that represents a raft during a ceremony that today is known as “El Dorado”. In this ritual, the caciques of the central mountain range of the Colombian Andes dressed in gold dust and gave offerings of emeralds and gold to the lagoons.
For the indigenous peoples in Colombia, gold is the vital energy of father sun while the lagoons are the womb of mother earth. In the ritual that the Spaniards named El Dorado, the golden cacique offered gold and emeralds to the water to renew life in a pact with nature.
