I Am Going to Write a Letter emerged during the development of The Tree of Longings: A Codex of Human Rights, a series of paintings through which I engage with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The Declaration is a text already written, an agreement that proposes how we should treat one another. While working on the paintings, another question began to accompany the project: Is making art enough to change the world? I do not know. Over time, that question became more practical: where do I still have the possibility of taking part?

The project takes place in Colombia because I am a Colombian citizen and because my political memory and understanding of rights were formed there. While studying the mechanisms of participation established by the 1991 Political Constitution, I became interested in something that might appear obvious: as a citizen, I can address the people who represent me while legislation is still being discussed.

I had learned how concrete this kind of participation could be years earlier, while working as a community liaison with public-health researcher Luis Vélez at the University of Texas. His project addressed the dangers of smoking, and part of that work involved teaching people how to contact their representatives—by writing letters, making phone calls, and communicating directly with legislators—to influence laws restricting smoking in public places. It became clear that I could bring what I had learned in the United States into my own relationship with Colombia: contact the people making the laws while those laws were still being shaped.

This created a different relationship to the kinds of texts I had been studying. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights is an agreement already written. A bill before Congress is a text still in process. Its language can be debated, amended, approved, or rejected, and during that process there is still an opportunity to have a say. Writing to Congress gave me a concrete way to exercise that possibility.

My relationship with the environment comes from the place where I grew up. My family home in Villavicencio sits within a beautiful patch of green that, instead of being developed, my aunt has continued to transform into a botanical garden. Having access to green space is a privilege, and perhaps that is why I have always loved national parks: places where land is protected for everyone.

As a teenager, I read the Bible and a book by James Lovelock about his Gaia theory. One gave me the image of paradise; the other, a way of understanding Earth as an interdependent living system. It took me decades to bring them together. That connection eventually became The Biology of Paradise: the proposition that paradise may be the biological conditions that make human life possible

The title I Am Going to Write a Letter comes from a phrase I heard repeatedly while I was in college and living with my roommate, Gloria. Whenever something happened that she disliked—on television, in a store, or in an encounter with someone—she would emphatically announce, “I’m going to write a letter.” She never did. Years later, the phrase returned to me through this project. This time, I write the letter.

What if “Paradise” was simply humanity’s first attempt to describe the environmental conditions required for us to flourish?

Our civilization rests on a narrow biological foundation, and human freedom operates within its physical boundaries.

We cannot destroy the Earth. We can destroy the conditions that make human life possible on Earth.

This is why I write to the Colombian Congress about environmental legislation. I defend human beings, so I defend Paradise.

Across cultures, humans have imagined versions of Paradise: places of abundance, water, vegetation, food, beauty, and ease. I begin with Genesis because it is the story I inherited, growing up in Colombia, a country deeply shaped by Catholicism.

Genesis describes Paradise as a lush and abundant world. Four rivers move through fertile land. Trees rise everywhere, heavy with fruit. There is water to drink and food within reach; animals move among the vegetation. The days bring light and warmth, the nights arrive, seasons turn, and the air touches the skin gently enough that the human body needs no barrier between itself and the world. A person can walk naked beneath the open sky, breathe deeply, drink from the water, reach for food, lie on the ground, and sleep. The world receives the body as if the body belongs there.

Paradise belongs to the language of story. Habitability belongs to the language of science. They point toward the same biological reality.

Biologically, the same landscape can be described in measurable terms: an oxygen-rich atmosphere; liquid freshwater; temperatures compatible with human thermoregulation; atmospheric pressure within human physiological tolerance; protection from harmful solar radiation; available carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, phosphorus, and sulfur; and functioning ecosystems of plants, animals, fungi, and microorganisms that cycle nutrients and sustain food webs.

Life has existed on Earth for approximately 3.8 billion years. If those 3.8 billion years were represented by a 3.8-meter string, the approximately 300,000 years of Homo sapiens would occupy only 0.3 millimeters at its end.

For almost that entire history, there was life without us. Life has taken radically different forms: microbial worlds, oceans filled with unfamiliar marine organisms, immense fern and lycophyte forests, dinosaurs, and eventually mammals. These were living worlds, some extraordinarily abundant, but they were different from the world in which humans evolved.

A world full of life is not necessarily a world favorable to human life.

Inside this pale blue dot*, human beings have understood their relationship to the natural world in many ways: as owners, rulers, stewards, or participants within it. We have built civilizations, transformed landscapes, crossed oceans, fought wars, created religions, philosophies, sciences, and technologies, and felt the allure of being the most intelligent and powerful species in the world. Our capacity to alter the world has become immense. Much remains beyond our control, yet we can transform enough of it to change the conditions in which we live.

And here lies the paradox: we have enormous power to transform the world around us, while our biological needs remain the same. We have real agency inside biological dependence, including the ability to destroy the very conditions that make our freedom possible.

The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand.*

I want to live. I want my family to live. I want every human being on this planet to have the possibility of life.

If I am going to talk about human rights, this has to come first. Before I can argue about dignity, freedom, equality, justice, or how we should treat one another, there has to be someone alive to have that conversation.

Human rights are one of our attempts to answer the question: how do we live together?

But first, we have to live.

Colombia rises from two oceans into three branches of the Andes, then falls toward immense plains, tropical forests, wetlands, deserts, and the Amazon. Rivers descend from mountains and páramos, cross forests savannas and  watersheds. Within a relatively small territory, altitude changes everything: temperature, rainfall, vegetation, animals, and crops. Orchids grow beside thousands of other plant species; birds fill forests, wetlands, mountains, and cities; jaguars, monkeys, amphibians, insects, fungi, and microorganisms inhabit worlds layered one above another. Water is everywhere—in rain, rivers, wetlands, glaciers, páramos, underground systems, and two seas.

This is my little piece of Paradise.

When I defend it, I defend every one of us.

This is why I write to the Colombian Congress about environmental legislation.

I am protecting Paradise.

*Carl Sagan

1. Selection of a Bill

The search begins in the Legislative Search Portal of the Congress of the Republic. Bills are selected according to their relationship to human rights, collective life, or the social and environmental conditions that make the exercise of those rights possible.

The bill must still be under consideration, at a stage when civic participation can contribute to the discussion.

2. Development of the Legislative File

I gather the information necessary to understand the bill and its progress through Congress:

• bill number and title;
• full text of the bill;
• statement of purpose;
• committee reports and amendments;
• Congressional Gazettes;
• current stage of the legislative process;
• responsible committee;
• sponsors, rapporteurs, and coordinating rapporteurs;
• relevant legislative history.

Before proceeding, I verify the information to establish the bill’s most recent status.

3. Reading and Analysis

I examine the proposal, its principal articles, and the changes it could produce. The research considers the problem the bill attempts to address, who may benefit or be affected, the rights involved, and the possible consequences of its provisions.

4. Development of a Position

Based on this research, I develop an argued position. A letter may support the bill, propose amendments, question specific articles, request that the bill continue through the legislative process, or ask for its withdrawal or archive.

The arguments are supported by the legislative file and, when necessary, additional research, evidence, and sources.

5. Identification of Recipients

The letter is addressed to the people who have institutional responsibility for studying, amending, debating, or voting on the bill at its current stage.

If the bill is under consideration in a committee, recipients may include the rapporteurs and coordinating rapporteurs, members of the corresponding committee, and the committee secretariat. If the bill has reached a plenary session, the letter is addressed to members of the legislative chamber participating in the debate and vote.

Names, positions, and contact information are verified through the official websites of the Chamber of Representatives and the Senate.

6. Drafting and Production

The content of the letter is drafted and reviewed. Its arguments, sources, bill number, legislative status, and recipients are verified.

The final letter is written by hand or on a manual typewriter. The choice of paper and writing instrument is made as part of the production of each work.

7. Reproduction and Delivery

Each letter produces:

• the original handwritten or manually typewritten letter;
• a high-quality photocopy for the project archive;
• a scanned PDF file.

The original is sent to Congress by postal mail, and the PDF is emailed to the appropriate recipients. Postal receipts and records of electronic delivery are retained.

8. Video Documentation

Each letter is accompanied by a video introducing the selected bill, explaining why I chose it, identifying the legislators responsible for its legislative process, and presenting the position developed in the letter.

The video documents the action and becomes part of the project record.

9. Archive and Follow-Up

Each letter is preserved with a file containing its physical and digital documentation, the sources consulted, legislative information, recipients, delivery records, and any responses received.

I continue following the bill after the letter is sent, documenting subsequent amendments, votes, and its final legislative outcome.

This keeps the methodology very concrete. It also rescues the video from the original statement and puts it where it belongs, while the handwriting/typewriter, archive, PDF, postal delivery, research, and follow-up are all clearly accounted for.

Artificial intelligence occupies a contradictory position within this project. I use ChatGPT and other AI tools to search for information, read bills, understand legislative processes, and formulate questions. These technologies expand my capacity to research and participate, yet their operation depends on data centers that consume energy, water, land, and materials.

Technology cannot be separated from the physical infrastructure that sustains it. The question, therefore, is not only what artificial intelligence can do, but under what material conditions it is developed and how we can use it in an environmentally responsible way.

This research considers the energy and water consumption of data centers, their cooling systems, territorial location, energy sources, emissions, and the transparency with which companies report these impacts. It also asks what responsibilities should be assumed by governments and by the companies that build and operate this infrastructure.

In the Colombian Congress, I found one relevant precedent: Bill 324 of 2025 Chamber – 043 of 2025 Senate, which proposed regulating artificial intelligence through an ethical, responsible, and sustainable approach and referred to the development of technological infrastructure. The bill was archived and is no longer under legislative consideration.

So far, there is no active bill that specifically addresses the environmental effects of artificial intelligence and data centers. This entry therefore does not yet correspond to a letter. It remains an open investigation and a continuing concern within I Am Going to Write a Letter.

Artificial intelligence is part of my process, while the infrastructure that supports it becomes an object of study. This contradiction does not cancel my use of the tool; it establishes the question guiding this research: How can we develop and use these technologies without compromising the environmental conditions that sustain life?

What Kind of Legal Process Is This?

This is not a bill or a law being considered by Congress. It is an administrative process conducted by the Ministry of Environment, part of the executive branch.

A resolution is a binding administrative decision issued under powers previously granted to the Ministry by existing laws. Therefore, the protection of La Baja does not need to be debated or voted on by Congress. The Ministry can establish, modify, or revoke the reserve through administrative resolutions, provided that it follows the required technical, legal, and public-participation procedures.

Santurbán and La Baja: Timeline and Key Actors

Introduction: The Difference Between Santurbán and La Baja

The Santurbán páramo is a legally protected high-altitude ecosystem with officially defined boundaries. The La Baja watershed lies outside those legal boundaries but within the broader Santurbán massif.

La Baja does not necessarily possess all the ecological characteristics of a páramo. However, technical studies by the Colombian Geological Survey (SGC) and IDEAM indicate that the páramo, the high-Andean forest, groundwater, and surface water function as one interconnected hydrological system.

The controversy therefore concerns 1,499 hectares in La Baja, not the removal of protection from the entire Santurbán páramo. The central issue is that the law separates the territories, but the water connects them.

Timeline and Key Developments

• Before August 2026 — Scientific studies and public participation
  The Ministry of Environment, supported by studies from SGC and IDEAM, evaluated the ecological and hydrological importance of La Baja. It also conducted a public environmental-participation process involving affected communities.
• Legal challenges — The participation process is questioned
  Residents and local organizations challenged the procedure. The Eighth Administrative Court of Bucaramanga identified possible violations of the fundamental rights of residents of California, Santander, and ordered the Ministry to restart the process with proper legal guarantees and public participation.
• August 6, 2026 — Definitive reserve created
  Under Acting Environment Minister Irene Vélez Torres, the Ministry issued Resolution 0994. It declared 1,499.23 hectares of La Baja a definitive natural-resources reserve. The measure prevented new contracts, authorizations, and environmental licenses for medium- and large-scale mining within the reserve.
• August 13, 2026 — Protection revoked
  Under the new environment minister, Fabio Arjona, the Ministry issued Resolution 1037, revoking Resolution 0994. The Ministry cited procedural irregularities, an unresolved recusal, and the court order requiring the public-participation process to be restarted.
• Immediate impact — A specific protection gap
  The revocation did not authorize mining or alter the protection of the legally delimited Santurbán páramo. However, it removed the definitive La Baja reserve and the restrictions it placed on new medium- and large-scale mining projects.
• Aris Mining and Soto Norte
  Aris Mining, owner of the Soto Norte gold project, has interests in the area. The revocation removes an important legal obstacle for the project, but it does not authorize extraction. Soto Norte remains subject to Colombia’s ordinary mining and environmental-licensing procedures.
• Citizen response — Legal action and mobilization
  The Comité para la Defensa del Agua y del Páramo de Santurbán has announced legal actions, collected public support, and questioned Minister Arjona’s impartiality. The Committee argues that damage to La Baja’s water system could affect the wider Santurbán massif.

Current Status — August 29, 2026

Resolution 0994 has been revoked. Consequently, the 1,499 hectares of La Baja no longer have the specific definitive-reserve designation created by that resolution.

The area remains subject to Colombia’s ordinary environmental and mining regulations, but it no longer has the additional protection that prevented new medium- and large-scale mining authorizations.

The Ministry has announced a new technical, legal, and public-participation process. However, it has not yet published a clear timetable or established an equivalent interim safeguard for La Baja.

Other measures protecting the legally delimited Santurbán páramo and the broader temporary reserve remain in effect. The current protection gap concerns the specific La Baja reserve, not the entire Santurbán ecosystem.

The Unresolved Question

What legal or temporary measure will protect the La Baja watershed while the Ministry repeats the process, and will it ultimately restore the definitive environmental reserve?

Sources: Ministry announcement establishing the reserve and Ministry announcement revoking it.