I started Katünaa because of the way studying art history taught me to look at objects, not just as things, but as carriers of meaning.
I was drawn to art history because I loved museums, images, and the way objects could tell stories far beyond what you see at first glance. In that world, nothing exists without context.
Studying art history trains you to ask questions constantly. Not just what does this painting look like? but what techniques did the artist use, and how did those choices affect the work? What choices did they make in composition, color, and form? What ideas or emotions were they trying to convey? What was happening socially, politically, economically at the time?
When I returned to Colombia, I wanted to work with something deeply rooted in the country, its crafts. I quickly realized that the handmade objects we live with every day are not so different from works of art. Yet they are often overlooked, labeled as “craft,” “decorative,” or “tribal”. At the same time, our homes were filling up with objects whose origins and stories we didn’t really know.
We knew how something looked, but not what it carried, and I wanted to keep exploring this!! 😅
Materials are not abstract. They come from specific places. They are shaped by climate, land, and available resources. They are worked by human hands, guided by knowledge that is often passed down through generations, adapted, and refined over time. When you remove that context, you don’t just simplify the object, you erase part of its meaning!
This is especially visible in artisanal traditions around the world.
Colombia is not just rich in biodiversity, it’s rich in material knowledge. From fibers and woods to metals and clays, each region has its own relationship to what the land offers. Objects respond to real needs, real environments, and real traditions. And yet, these objects are rarely spoken about with the same language we reserve for “art.”
That is what drives us at Katünaa. 🎨🩷
From the very start, I didn’t just want to collect handmade pieces. I wanted to honor the hands, the process, and the story behind each object, because no object is ever the result of just one person.
There is the artisan, whose skill comes from years of practice.
There is the material, shaped by geography and environment.
And there is also design, the part we actively participate in, where decisions are made about form, proportion, function, and how an object will live in someone’s home. There are many hands and many minds involved.
This is why I’ve always celebrated these objects as art, and hope you do too!!
They are individual works, they fulfill a function, they are the materialization of creative production and they are deeply tied to social, economic, and cultural realities. What gives them impact is the way personality, intention, and knowledge are woven into the object, from the first idea to the final result.
When you begin to ask different questions: where is this from? who made it? what is it made of? why this material? Everything starts to feel more alive and that, to me, is where art has always lived. Not only on museum walls, but in objects that carry memory, work, and history!
Katünaa exists because I never stopped looking at objects the way art history taught me to and because, honestly, how fun is it to fill your home with pieces that have a real story behind them?!