The process of drawing – or tracing – lines is to territory what writing is to language. In the territory, the tracing of a line stands as a critical (and political) decision about the analysis or the construction of a site. Informal maps have been since prehistory a way not only of recognizing the structure of a territory but also a way of transmitting tradition from one generation to another. Prehistoric humans drew cognitive maps as a way of collecting, not only goods and tools, but, most of all, knowledge.
Memory and history – the latter seen as our own personal interpretation of the former – are autonomous processes written in parallel as we, individuals, advance in life. Cultures are defined by the transmission of memory, language and the different symbols that enable tradition with its own cultural value. Languages evolve. Words are adapted to modern speaking. Symbols that are no longer needed, because their signification has lost all crucial meaning in the modern world, are suppressed and left behind as palimpsests revealing the different paths of humans in history.
YURI LEONARDO 