The Shipibo Conibo Center: Art as Medicine for the Environment
Americas | ISSUE 02by Louise Deglin
an invitation for Indigenous artists to make their work political so that the healing power of the kené (the linear patterns emblematic of Shipibo art) can benefit the Shipibo community at large
Based in Harlem, New York, the Shipibo Conibo Center (SCC) is a unique organization that serves as intermediator between the Shipibo Conibo people, an Indigenous group based in the Peruvian Amazon, and the Western art world. Far more than a gallery or a cultural center, the SCC is a multi-headed project that acts towards self-determination, environmental preservation, and intergenerational transmission of knowledge for the Shipibo Conibo People. It is, in the words of its co-founder, an invitation for Indigenous artists to make their work political so that the healing power of the kené (the linear patterns emblematic of Shipibo art) can benefit the Shipibo community at large. [...]
Photo: Celia Vasquez Yui, The Council of the Mother Spirits of the Animals, 2022 (installation view) Courtesy of the artist, The Shipibo Conibo Center, and Salon 94 © Photo Elisabeth Bernstein
