Maya Hackers WikiLab

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Maya Hackers designs ritual objects for the Re programming of collective imagery, inspired by shamanic practices applied in the social and political realm. Read the full Maya Hackers Manifesto.

Overview

Maya Hackers is a bundle of projects at the interphase between art, culture and social design. The projects explore ways to Re Inject Mayan culture elements into Guatemalan culture, as part of the transformation process taking place in the country.

The Maya Hackers projects propose future oriented views of Mayan culture at the interphase with other cultures, to break off with the strong stereotype that indigenous cultures are something from the past. In the same way the evolution of our body is stored in our DNA, many ancient cultural memes remain alive in contemporary culture. If those cultural memes have survived to this day, is because they play a role in the integrity and identity of social groups, and understanding them expands our capacity as human beings.

Ancient Cultures and Open Source

It happens with ancient cultures that their elements can be used without restriction, they are considered heritage of humanity. In practise they are treated like a free repository of designs and ideas that anybody can take and use. The issue is more complex when those ancient cultures are living cultures, because you could be taking an element that is highly significative for somebody. In some sense, for these people those cultural elements are part of themselves, and by taking such cultural elements you are interacting with them in some way.

Living Ancient Cultures analogy to Open Source

There is a difference in taking cultural elements that nobody uses anymore, and taking elements that still are part of the identity of a group. The first cultural elements could be treated like a free repository, but the second set are more like an open source repository. Open source is not equal to free stuff. Open source is a different kind of economy where many people work on a program for "free" because the program is their working tool to do other stuff. For example everybody in a community will naturally work together to construct a road or a bridge for the community, because everyone is going to use it, and nobody is able to do it alone.

With open source, it is the use value of the software what keeps the economy going. The contributors to the Open source project will gain reputation that can be readily exchanged in the environment of the project, for example to get a better job offer, or to get more financing for a project, etc. So working in the open source project for "free" is your way to promote yourself in this "reputation economy" that happens between the users of the software.

Take for example the Mayan textile, at the heart of this industry is the fact that Mayan woman produce it and wear it in a self supporting cycle. Since the textiles are very beautiful, they can also reach other markets and produced for export. But the need to evolve the designs and introduce new variations comes from the fact that women use it and are ready to pay for the new models coming up every season. Knowing how to make very customised designs is a highly priced ability, and that keeps the art alive. Nobody owns the designs, they are more valued the more people use them and understand them like the elements of a language shared by a community. The same way a poem makes something different out of words that everyone uses, a skilful designer can make a new textile out of the common design pool.

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The Seed Projects

The Maya Hackers projects are designed in analogy with seeds, the projects should contain the means to grow and propagate. To consider this "sustainability" of a project or the viability of a vector for a culture meme, is to couple it somehow to the economy, the fine point in the design is: Where is its source of energy? Who is going to pay for it?.

Contemporary Art

Textiles

Sculpture

Graphic Design

Video Production

Publications

Clothing

Arts and Crafts

Applied Research