Cosmic Seed Basket:
Cristina Ochoa
Bringing back the spirits of the seeds
4 July to 14 September 2025
That was the task ordered by the elders, the taitas from up heavens and down earth, as
grand father Berito Kuwaruwa told me when he asked them, they said this job has to be
done. This is seed is part of the origin.
The piece Is a time vessel in the erythrina americana seed minimum shape, amplified. The
colorin, Tzité, for the Mayans, Tzompantle In Nahuatl is connected to the origin of
humanity and times, according to the sacred book Popol Vuh the first grandparents throw
the seeds of Tzité along with the corn seeds to create humanity. The oracle practice of
seed reading with the erythrina americana is still in use by the Mayan quiché and by the
Mexica
who carries 260 seeds with precious stones in the sacred bag, and throw the over the
mayan calendar Tzolquin or Mexica tonalpahualli. The Mayan created the concept of cero depicted as a seed or a shell.
For the totonacas lak'tanga" o "lak'tilo" in Veracruz, this was also a sacred seed, a
protector used to prevent form evil eye and cure spiritual and natural illness: envy, tooth
pain, and muscular soreness as Doña Juana tell us.
The time travels in numbers and codes, from dates of recollection of the seed to different
purpuses, on the first of march, for evil eye, on the second to protect a business, and so
on, on 7 th until the last ones on the 13 th of march.
The effect of the ingestion seed is to stop time, as sedative, hypnotic, anesthetic and
analgesic, and psychoactive agent.
Inside this structure build with bamboo, iron and natural dyed cotton fabrics, with Colorin
seeds, Dragons Blood, achiote (annatto), grana cochinilla, moons blood, zapote. The work
of weaving of 20 nets of seeds are trans dimensional portals and amulets of protection.
You find the sound of the Erythrina americana seed, taken from the electrical resistance
thru a vegetal sound translator, the sound has a bird style codes, and Mrs Juana Gonzalez,
voice in Spanish, telling her relationship with the seed and the tree. She’s a traditional
Healer from Tlapacoyan, Veracruz. Who take us in her narrative to the seed as an
interstice on dimensional passage to times, honoring her tradition and the law of origin of
American people, or Abya Yala.
We will broadcast from this cero temporal seed station and also grow a plant of erythrina
americana the piece will be vanished and disappeared.
Cristina Ochoa
CREDITS
Cosmic Seed Basket
Cristina Ochoa
Mexico
Site Specific installation
4 meters long, by 2.70 Hight by 2.20 wide
Bamboo, metal structure
Natural dyed cotton fabrics
Sound from the Erythrina Americana Seed
Voice Juana Gonzalez Tlapacoyan, Veracruz, Mexico
Weaving seeds Yolanda Sanchez, Tlapacoyan Veracruz, Mexico
Juana González -Tradtional healer-, Tlapacoyan,Veracruz. Mexico
Eduardo Benítez -Sound of the seed-, Sound engineer, Mexico City
Juan Ignacio Cinich – Architect-, Tulum, México
Emily Jones, -Curator, Produc0on manager “Seedscapes”
25th anniversary Millenium Seed Bank. Kew Gardens, Wakehurst, UK
Set works, - Producton structure building- Croydon, UK.
Claudia López -Production manager on site- Tlapacoyan; Veracruz. México
Production team, Tlapacoyan; Veracruz
Martn Pimentel - cultural touris0c promoter, and Totonaca leader -
Pablo López, -cultural promoter, Tlapacoyan México
Special Thanks
Marleen Boshen. Interdisciplinary research fellow, RBG Kew
Berito Kuwaruba, Spiritual Leader, Uwa people, Colombia.
Guadalupe Corona, Grandmother, Traditonal Healer, Tetla, Tlaxcala, Mexico
Tata Cristóbal Cojti. Aljib. Guatemala
Don Valerio Canché. X-Meen Merida, Yucatán, Mexico
Tiziana Ulian, Kew Gardens, Millenium Seed Bank
Isela Rodríguez, Kew Gardens, UNAM. Mexico City
María Chavez, Kew Gardens, UNAM, Mexico City
Silvia Bacci Millenium Seed
Bank Kew Wakehurst, UK
Gabina Sol Quintas, Pronatura Coatepec, Veracruz.
Javier Calderon, Somers gallery, London, UK.
4 July to 14 September 2025
Cristina Ochoa
Born in Bogotá, Colombia, in 1976, Cristina, who is now based in Mexico, studied Architecture and Visual Arts at the Pontificia Universidad Javeriana and at the Universidad Nacional in Bogotá. Following her studies, she attended several postgraduate courses, including Cultural Management and Copyrights at Universidad Nacional Autonoma de México (UNAM) and Mexican Art History at MUAC, respectively. In her latest years she has focused on the study of herbology and its application in the pharmaceutical field. She is interested in cultural myths and ceremonies, observing the way in which these are interpreted and assimilated by the population.
Her work has been exhibited extensively in Colombia and internationally, in venues including: Salón Nacional de Artistas in Colombia (2010), Caos en el Paraíso, Centro Colombo Americano (Bogotá, 2010), Massimo Audiello Gallery in Mexico city (2012), La creciente, Ex Teresa Arte Actual (Mexico, 2011), Arte#Ocupa (Brazil, 2013), MAZ Museo de Arte de Zapopan (Mexico, 2015), Demasiado Futuro, Centro Cultural de España, ACME, In-situ (México, 2013), and FIFTY/ FIFTY, La Chimba (Buenos Aires, 2014); and most recently, CICLO Galileo 92 (Mexico, 2021), Arafura (2021), Carrillo Gil Art Museum (2021), Anahuacalli Museum (2021), Sound Plus Festival (2021), Jumex Museum, (MexicoCity 2022), Somers Gallery, (London, UK 2023) and Kew Gardens (Sussex, 2025)