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Pablo Amaringo: the Ayahuasca artist

The Pablo Amaringo's history and life is remarkable, though he never screamed for attention. Public attention found him because his magical artwork that reminds us that there's a magic realm in front of us waiting to be discovered.

Who was Pablo Amaringo?

Pablo was born in Puerto Libertad, Ucayali, Perú, at 1943. The name of this location, Puerto Libertad, means 'Liberty Harbor' in English. Maybe it was a clue about his future.

 

Pablo Amaringo art

Pablo was part of a very poor family. He barely received a normal education. He had to work to support his own family. At the age of seventeen he became extremely ill because of his heart problems. He almost died. But then, magic worked.

 

Pablo Amaringo art

Pablo Amaringo meets ayahuasca

The local healer treated Pablo with ayahuasca and other healing herbs. Then, Pablo started to create his first astonising paintings. He draw what he saw during his healing trips. Because his povertry, he used to make his painting materials such pencils, cosmetics and coloring substances that a mechanic friend gave to him.

 

 

Since this frist experience, Pablo Amaringo improved his artistic works and became himself a shaman. In these days he never left povertry. He barely survived selling his paintings and doing healing works. But he was happy. He had discovered the power of ayahuasca. He was a true believer. He was in communion with nature. Once, he said:

"Ayahuasca is not something to be taken lightly. It can kill not because it is in itself toxic, but because the body may not be strong enough to receive so much knowledge and wisdom."

The Usko-Ayar Amazonian School of Painting

Pablo Amaringo wanted to spread his true love for nature, ayahuasca and art. He founded at 1988 with the help of the anthropologist and ayahuasca researcher Luis Eduardo Luna the Usko-Ayar Amazonian School of Painting. In this school he taught young local artists to get inspiration from nature, cosmos and their own personal experiences. This practice is called 'Vegetalismo'. This institution won the United Nations award in 1992.

 

Pablo Amaringo art

Vegetalismo

Vegetalismo is not  an artistic movement created by Pablo Amaringo. It's a lifestyle, a life philosophy. A form of religion that Pablo embraced to create his paintings. The vegetalistas believe in the healing power of the plants of the Amazonian region. The ayahuasca, of course, is one of these plants. The vegetalismo practice mixes ancient animistic beliefs with Catholicism elements. They claim to be in a special relationship with Amazonian spirits that give them the power to heal and protect the people. This spirits can take human, animal or vegetal form. The vegetalistas are in contact too with entities that exist in a worl appart (beigns from the cosmos), only accesible by the shamans. These beigns give the shamans their power.

 

Pablo Amaringo art

 

Pablo Amaringo died at the age of 71. He had become a vegetalismo exponent, a great shaman and an inmortal artist.

To know more: Pablo Amaringo's Art Book

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