The chapter titled “Diario de viaje” [Travel Diary] is the first section of the essay Paisajes de la memoria [Landscapes of Memory] that Lorena Kraus wrote about her experience translating the German travel diaries into Spanish kept by her grandfather, the artist and mountain climber Erwin Kraus. In the 1940s, Erwin Kraus went on expeditions in the mountains of Colombia, and his granddaughter’s essay that describes his travels is divided into four parts, as follows:
i) The first section consists of a detailed description of Erwin Kraus’s travel diaries. It describes their physical properties, aspects of the handwriting, and the condition they are in. Lorena Kraus reviews the information contained in the diaries: the narrative that itemizes details of the artist’s travels, including places visited, fellow travelers, daily activities, atmospheric and geographical measurements, financial accounts, routes and maps, and spontaneous sketches “of scenes that [Erwin Kraus] would like to paint.” She also describes how the (movie style) shooting scripts are organized and are ready for filming. Based on the scripts for tours II, III, and IV (to the Nevado del Cocuy), Lorena wrote her own versions as visual supports to complement her research.
ii) In the second section, Lorena focuses on the diaries she has translated, which document tours II, III, IV (to the Nevado del Cocuy). She describes her grandfather’s writing style, explaining that he is at times objective, at others technical, and in general is sensitive to his surroundings as he records daily events and his impressions of the Colombian countryside.
iii) In the third section, headed “Silencios” [Silences], Lorena reflects on what she does not find in her grandfather’s notes, listing things that are not mentioned in his diaries. Among them is what motivated her grandfather to climb mountains in Colombia, presumably because of his love of the natural world. She considers what another author has written about the same expeditions, and muses about what photography means to someone like Erwin Kraus: she wonders about its documentary function on journeys of this nature and what part it plays in the activities of a landscape painter. She also mentions the few references to the war that was raging in Europe at that time, and speculates that her grandfather’s trips were his way of isolating himself from what was going on in the world.
iv) In the final section, Lorena discusses her own impressions concerning the process of reading and translating her grandfather’s travel diaries. She explains how it felt to immerse herself in her grandfather’s thoughts and become very familiar with his diaries. The exercise made demands of her own imagination and creativity, which she was able to express through the translations and the production of the videos.