Amazonian Indiginous Art

Conocí a Rember Yahuarcani hace cinco años, cuando él tenía diecinueve y acababa de mudarse a Lima por primera vez sin otro recurso financiero que lo que podía ganar vendiendo sus pinturas. Autodidacta, descendiente por su abuela paterna del clan Aymenu del pueblo uitoto, se crió en Pebas, a orillas del Amazonas, donde cursó la primaria y la secundaria. Hoy día es uno de los jóvenes artistas plásticos más prometedores del Perú. Con trece exposiciones individuales, veintitrés exposiciones colectivas, ganador de la segunda Bienal intercontinental de arte indígena (Quito, 2008), y del primer Concurso de cuentos ilustrados Carlota Carvallo de Núñez (Lima, 2009), ha sabido entrar en espacios nunca antes abiertos a un indígena amazónico

Diseños materiales e inmateriales: la patrimonialización Del kené shipibo-konibo y De la ayahuasca en el perú Resumen Este artículo muestra que la asociación entre plantas y grafismos posibilitó la declaración en paralelo del kené shipibo-konibo y del uso tradicional de la ayahuasca como patrimonio inma-terial del Perú en 2008. Describe el contexto de producción y comercialización por las mujeres de objetos cubiertos con kené y su relación con los diseños inmateriales vistos en sesiones de ayahuasca y usados en la nueva pintura chamánica. Examina las nociones de visualidad, materialidad e identidad desarrolladas en el expediente de patrimonialización del kené y las compara al énfasis puesto sobre la salud y lo sagrado en el estudio de patrimonialización de la ayahuasca. A pesar de diversas limitaciones, en ambos casos se asumió el carácter cambiante de los grafismos y del uso de las plantas y se evitó hacer inventarios y caer en una reificación de los conocimientos y las prácticas visionarias. material anD immaterial Designs: the patrimonialization of the shipibo-conibo kene Designs anD of the traDitional use of ayahuasca in peru Abtract The paper examines how the association between plants and graphic arts led to the simultaneous patrimonialization of the Shipibo-Conibo kene designs and of the traditional use of ayahuasca by the Peruvian government in 2008. It describes the context of production and commercializa-tion by women of kene objets and its link to immaterial designs seen in ayahuasca sessions and used in new shamanic paintings. It examines the notions of visuality, materiality and identity laid out in the kene patrimonialization report and compares them to the stress put upon health and the sacred in the ayahuasca report. Although they had several limitations, both cases state the changing character of designs and plant use and avoid drawing inventories and reifying knowledge and visionary practices.

This dissertation seeks to establish whether the neuroscientific principle of neuroplasticity aids in the understanding of Tukano hallucinatory art. The underlying proposition is that hallucinatory art allows more direct access to the workings of the brain than other art and therefore a neuroscientific principle could potentially aid our understanding in this area where art and biology overlap. In examining the link between hallucinations, hallucinatory art and neuroplasticity, the reciprocal affects of cultural and neurology is a central concern. A multi-disciplinary approach is adopted incorporating aspects of art history, neuroscience and anthropology. The dissertation starts by providing a detailed case study of the explicitly hallucinatory art of the Amazonian Tukano, which draws on the work of Reichel-Dolmatoff, and explores the links between cultural context, ayahuasca-induced hallucinations and art. The theoretical framework is then established, and the recent application of neuroscience to art, specifically the principle of neuroplasticity and its possible affects on drug-induced hallucinations is examined. The dissertation culminates in the application of neuroplasticity to the Tukano designs, before reaching tentative conclusions on the relationship between this neuroscientific principle and the Tukano imagery derived from ayahuasca induced hallucinations, between art and the brain.

Resumo: A obra " Tesouro descoberto no máximo rio Amazonas " (1757-1776), do jesuíta João Daniel, é considerada uma das principais fontes sobre o Amazonas durante o período colonial, sendo importante documento a respeito do quanto o conhecimento da natureza e das tradições culturais indígenas foram pedras fundamentais para o desenvolvimento do trabalho artístico nas missões. É particularmente no tratado intitulado " Das tintas mais especiais do rio Amazonas " que Daniel traz informes sobre a assimilação por parte dos jesuítas quanto às técnicas e aos materiais indígenas para fazer tintas e pintar obras artísticas; assim como sobre a adoção, pelos indígenas, de motivos ornamentais de repertório europeu e de origem asiática, em objetos de sua própria cultura, o que parece indicar, no âmbito das investigações arqueológica e etnográfica, que as transferências culturais ocorreram em várias direções. Por outro lado, também é sabido, no modernismo brasileiro, da utilização de motivos indígenas e/ou da representação da natureza amazônica por parte de artistas como Manoel Pastana, Theodoro Braga, Fernando Correia Dias ou Carlos Hadler, visando a construção de um repertório de matriz nacional para as artes decorativas. Palavras-chave: Arte. Arqueologia. Transferências culturais. Missões jesuíticas. Modernismo. Amazônia. Abstract: The " Tesouro descoberto no máximo rio Amazonas " (1757-1776) by the Jesuit João Daniel is considered one of the main sources about the Amazon during the colonial period, and an important testimony about how knowledge of nature and indigenous cultural traditions were cornerstones for the development of arts in the Missions. Especially in the chapter " Das tintas mais especiais do rio Amazonas " , does Daniel reports on the Jesuits' adoption of indigenous techniques and materials both to produce colors as well as paintings. At the same time, indigenous artists incorporated European and Asian ornamental motifs in objects of their own culture. This appears to indicate, in the field of archaeological and ethnographic research, that these cultural transfers occurred in various directions. On the other hand, also known in Brazilian modernism, is the use of indigenous motifs and/or the representation of Amazonian nature by artists such as Manoel Pastana, Theodoro Braga, Fernando Correia Dias or Carlos Hadler, who aimed at building a national repertoire for the decorative arts.

Today Amazonian contemporary art is acquiring more visibility as it circulates through national and international art venues. The growing interest and awareness on Amazonian ontologies by academia and art platforms with the influential studies of Descola (2006) and Viveiros de Castro (2009) are helping, but difficulties in improving the protocols of showing, writing and understanding Amazonian art in the Western art world still remain. As scholarly attention is driven by this international mobility of indigenous art, this panel aims, however, to change the focus back to the indigenous communities and explores the different ways in which Amazonian indigenous art and artists impact their own collectivities not only in socio- economic terms but particularly in its owns ontological and epistemological dimensions.
The panel seeks to explore two aspects of the same phenomena, examining (i) how Amazonian art, particularly in its forms of figuration participates and influences other sensory-aesthetic and performative registers such as mythology, ritual and shamanism, as well as on fixing imaginaries when transmutation or metamorphosis of bodies, behavior and senses is central to Amazonian cosmopolitics; (ii) examining Amazonian art as a device for incorporating alterity in terms of subjects, objects and techniques (exogenous landscapes, modern technologies, perspective, oil painting, etc.).
Some of the questions that this panel seeks to approach are what does art do in stabilizing imaginaries? How do artists represent mutable and non-visual beings? How does art impact other sensory- aesthetics practices? And, how does the agency of Amazonian art enact in its own sociocultural environment?

Robert Baca-Oviedo a soutenu en juin un mémoire particulièrement original et convaincant autour du film Fitzcarraldo de Werner Herzog. Une des originalités résidait dans le type de contextualisation qu’il y opérait. Refusant de limiter la signification durable du film aux polémiques qui avaient entouré sa sortie (concernant notamment les rapports très tendus que Herzog aurait entretenus avec les figurants indiens – ce qui n’est pas invraisemblable dans le mesure où tout le tournage était une suite de crises, y compris avec son interprète principal, Klaus Kinsky), Baca montre comment Herzog s’était lancé dans un projet mégalomaniaque et fou : réincarner la conquête de l’inutile qui était devenu depuis longtemps un synonyme de l’entreprise de Brian Sweeney Fitzgerald qui s’était proposé de construire un opéra à Iquitos en pleine jungle pour y faire venir d’illustres chanteurs, actrices etc. Baca montre comment le film - notamment à cause de la séquence documentaire hallucinée dans laquelle le cinéaste filme son équipe de figurants indiens et d’acteurs en train de recréer dans les conditions réelles l’arasement de la colline séparant le bassin de l'Ucayali du bassin de Madre de Dios et le hissage du bateau en haut de la colline suivie de sa glissade le long de l’autre versant de la colline jusqu’au fleuve - a réussi à devenir lui-même un nouvel épisode du mythe fitzgeraldien (un musée est d’ailleurs consacré à Herzog et son film à Iquitos). Baca combine l’étude du tournage du film (basée entre autres sur des sources locales qu’il est le premier à étudier) avec une étude historique plus étendue situant à la fois l’entreprise du Fitzgerald historique et celle du « Fitzcarraldo » herzogien dans l’histoire de l’Amazonie. Il insère ainsi de manière élégante son analyse esthétique et herméneutique de l’entreprise fictionnelle de Herzog et l’élucidation de la figure historique de Fitzgerald (qui fut le roi du caoutchouc) dans le cadre plus vaste de l’histoire culturelle, économique et socio- politique de la région amazonienne. (Jean-Marie Schaeffer).

From a reading of the texts in the dossier ¡Mira! Artes Visuales Contemporáneas de los Pueblos Indígenas (contemporary visual arts of the indigenous peoples), the authors draw attention to the fact that the creative processes narrated by the artists are acts of communication which do not reduce themselves to a cultural translation, since they involve multiple acts of transformation—of the bodies, the techniques, the images and the artists themselves. Their works of art call upon the spectator to become part of such a creative transformability.

Buscamos identificar os mecanismos de expansão da fotografia e do vídeo em suas relações com o conteúdo literário nos trabalhos produzidos pioneiramente pelo grupo Caixa de Pandora no estado do Pará, Brasil. Constatamos a presença do que chamamos de Redes de Colaboração, interconectadas a partir dos seguintes Nós de Interação: 1) o processo de tradução do conteúdo literário, 2) a fotografia expandida, e 3) a espacialização da imagem.Palavras-chave: processos de tradução, espacialização, redes de colaboração