(c) Geremia Commetti
Q’eros: A Study in Survival is a paper written by Photographer and Filmmaker John Cohen. In 1957 John spent seven months in Peru studying the people and taking photographs. When John went to Q'eros he discovered that some of the elders still used the quipu, a system of accounting and language developed by the Inca for keeping records. In 1957 John was literally one of the first outsiders to enter Q'eros lands. At this time Q'eros was still under the Hacendado system in Peru where the country was divided amongst few families who controlled land and commerce. In this system the Q'eros and most indigenous cultures where forced to live under servitude and in the case of Q'eros under a long history of abuse. In 1979 John returned to Q'eros to film a documentary entitled Q'eros: The Shape of Survival and in 1990 he returned again to film another documentary about the Carnival Festival Carnival in Q'eros.
The 1957 paper Q'eros: a study in survival is published by Natural History Magazine
More information about the Qiupu system can be found in the the book The Mathematics of the Incas. All purchases of books on Amazon recommended by The Path of the Sun help fund the completion of the movie.
Comments