Urban Shamans

The great master Felix, Curandero, spiritualist and macumberos, receives in an elegant building in the town center. Expert in love ties ”for the three sexes”, in this picture the curandero is portrayed during a propitiating rite through the use of coca leaves and black tobacco.

The office of Maestro Curandero Santos Cruz, healer, spiritist and parapsychologist is located in the back room of a small store on Avenida Tacna, in Lima's city center. Inside the store, billboards announce the sale of products and treatments for sexual virility and interruption of pregnancies.

Lima, the studio of Adrian Vera, also known as El Tuno, is situated in the cellar of a building in the town center, hidden behind a phone shop. The Studio devoid of windows and completly painted in black is full of amulets for the ceremonials and houses varius animals belonging to the curanderos. Between them the loyal black cat, an anaconda and a black hen.

A portrait of Gisell, the ”goddess of destiny”, Curandera, Astrologist and black/red magic specialist. She has her office in an elegant building on Avenida Tacna, one of Lima's avenues most densely populated by curanderos.

A rag doll used during a ritual to establish a love tie.

A large percentage of the Peruvian population usually visits curanderos and shamans to solve a very wide array of issues: health, work, business, etc. In Lima, where more than half of the population is the result of migrations, it's possible to find any type of curanderos, who compete with doctors and psichiatrists. In this picture a portait of Sara Huarnizo Vera, Curandera Mayor, coming from the north region of the country, she receives her patients in a small shack located in the famous district of the Km 8, where a lot of shamans concentrate.

In this photo a detail of the studio of the curandero: a dead frog and a photo are used for a macumba ritual.

Lima, the studio of Adrian Vera, also known as El Tuno, is situated in the cellar of a building in the town center. El Tuno, master healer and spiritualist, is one of the most popular curanderos of the town even in virtue of a daily local television program of which is the protagonist.

A detail of the studio of the curandero: A skull and some candles used the night before for a cerimonial.

A portrait of the master Curandero Santos Cruz, healer, spiritualist and parapsychologist. Santos Cruz practice the ancient ceremonial of cleansing with the cuy (the guinea pig).

The ancient ceremonial of the cleansing with the cuy. The cuy (the guinea pig), is an animal that has a very important role in the popular andina colture. Through the cleansing, which consists in rubbing and letting the cuy walk over the body of the person, the animal absorbes the ailments of the patient and dies. In a second phase the cuy is examineted and a diagnosis of the ailments that affected the patient is reached through the reading of the entrails.

The Curandera India Timbaya, ”Lady of eternal loves” expert in matrimonials ties and manufacturing of talismans, receives in an old building of the popoular district of La Victoria in Lima.

Curanderos treat ailments like susto (Spanish for fright), and mal de ojo (evil eye) with religious rituals, prayers, and ceremonial cleansing called "limpieza". Such cleansing happens through the use of animals capable of absorbing and catalyzing the illness literally rubbing them on the body of the person affected. Some of the animals used are: armadillo, cuy (guinea pig), black hen, white dove and other birds. The animal is also chosen on the basis of the economical conditions of the patient.