The world of art has lost a truly original visionary – a seer in all senses of the word. I think we all join together in wishing him a safe passage to the other side of the river…--Laurence Caruana
Legendary shaman, teacher and artist Don Pablo Amaringo died on the 16th of November in Pulcallpa, Peru after a lengthy battle with illness.
Born in 1943 in Puerto Libertad, in the Peruvian Amazon, he was ten years old when he first took ayahuasca. A severe heart illness--and the magical treatment of this via ayahuasca--led Pablo toward the life of a shaman, and he eventually became a powerful curandero
In 1977, Pablo abandoned his vocation as a shaman. He became a painter and art instructor at his Usko-Ayar school, where there was no charge for the students to learn painting from Pablo.
Renowned for his intricate, colourful depictions of his ayahuasca visions, he was first brought to the West's attention by Dennis McKenna and Luis Eduardo Luna, who met Pablo in Pucallpa while working on an ethnobotanical project. Amaringo and Luna later produced the book Ayahuasca Visions: The Religious Iconography of a Peruvian Shaman.
Before he passed away, he was working on paintings of angels, as well as paintings that documented the flora and fauna of Peru.
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