JAPARI – Our living memory

This online forum hopes to invite people to meet the magic of kené – ancestral Shipibo-Konibo geometric designs, which are usually illustrated in tapestries or ceramics. Kené is more than an art form but a means of communicating the Shipibo-Konibo cosmovision, spirituality, medicinal knowledge and culture.

The Shipibo-Konibo are indigenous people who live in the Ucayali region of the Peruvian Amazon. This online forum includes pictures and quotes from the colouring book Kené Sikati Kirika, crafted by Alianza Arkana, an indigenous Shipibo-Konibo NGO, in partnership with a collective of thirty Shipibo-Konibo artisans. Unable to sell their ceramics and tapestries due to the pandemic, they have found a new way to share their traditional kené designs with the world through the colouring book. This empowering initiative, captured through the lens of a Shipibo-Konibo photographer, enables the artists – young and old – to share their cosmovision and culture in a new and innovative way: "I seek to create portraits of my people’s memories" (Isa Rono, David Diaz, photographer).

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