Ramón Medina Silva was a mara'akáme of the Huichol people who also recorded his visions in yarn paintings: indeed, arguably he was the inventor of the visionary yarn painting genre. It was while gazing deeply into a book featuring his artworks and myth narratives one winter evening whilst living in Japan in 1997, that I made the momentous decision to become an artist. I therefore have a profound gratitude for Ramón, his life and his work: his style and vision inspires me to this day. It seems appropriate, then, at the outset of this Archaic Visions venture to express that gratitude in a short essay through which, I hope, Ramón Medina Silva's amazing legacy can become more widely known.
Huichol yarn paintings are justly famous in the world of anthropology and visionary art, expressing as they do the shamanic realities of peyote visions, and the sacred pilgrimages and myth cycles of the Huichol people. There are several notable modern yarn painters, the most celebrated perhaps being José Benítez Sánchez, an initiated shaman whose shimmering and detailed images have been exhibited in America and Europe and whose work is sometimes considered representative of the artform in its full expression of the sacred complexes underlying the peyote vision and the Huichol perceptual cosmos.
However, Ramón Medina Silva lived a generation before this widening celebration of Huichol art had come to pass, and he along with his wife Guadalupe de la Cruz Ríos (known as Lupe) were key innovators of Huichol folk arts into the narrative and visionary artforms well-known today.
Huichol yarn paintings are justly famous in the world of anthropology and visionary art, expressing as they do the shamanic realities of peyote visions, and the sacred pilgrimages and myth cycles of the Huichol people. There are several notable modern yarn painters, the most celebrated perhaps being José Benítez Sánchez, an initiated shaman whose shimmering and detailed images have been exhibited in America and Europe and whose work is sometimes considered representative of the artform in its full expression of the sacred complexes underlying the peyote vision and the Huichol perceptual cosmos.
However, Ramón Medina Silva lived a generation before this widening celebration of Huichol art had come to pass, and he along with his wife Guadalupe de la Cruz Ríos (known as Lupe) were key innovators of Huichol folk arts into the narrative and visionary artforms well-known today.
A portrait of Ramón Medina Silva, Bruce Rimell, 50cm x 70cm, 2010
Ramón is here depicted deep in trance, gazing at his peyote visions.
Ramón is here depicted deep in trance, gazing at his peyote visions.
Ramón was born, probably in the mid-1920s, in the Huichol community of San Sebastian in the Sierra Madre Occidental. His Huichol name was Ürü Temai, 'Young Arrow', and while his grandfather was a notable mara'akáme, his father was often absent and the family lived in poverty. As a boy, Ramón was bitten by a coral snake, which caused him paralysis in his legs for several months and almost killed him – later in life, Ramón would recognise this as the 'sickness vocation', the calling of a future shaman through illness. His grandfather eventually healed him but not before witnessing Ramón's pledge to 'complete' as a shaman before Tatewarí, Grandfather Fire, and Tayaupá, Father Sun.
As part of his 'completion' as a shaman, Ramón led several pilgrimages to Wirikuta for the famous Peyote Hunt, and although it is not certain whether by the time of his death he had completed the full six pilgrimages usually required to attain the full status of mara'akáme, MacLean reports that even from his first pilgrimage, he developed shamanic abilities very quickly. Furst states however that he completed his training in 1968.
Ramón and Lupe met as migrant labourers in Nayarit, married in the late 1940s and moved to Guadalajara in 1961, where they met the Franciscan Padre Ernesto and began selling traditionally-made crafts through the Basilica of Zapopan where the priest lived. By the mid 1960s, Ramón and Lupe had met American anthropologists Peter T Furst and Barbara G. Myerhoff, and the four began an inter-cultural collaboration that was to propel them into academic notability.
Furst says that previously, Huichol people had tended to use yarn painting as as a decorative tool for items like bowls, or as a folk art, using Huichol motifs with no particular significance that Ramón called puro adorno 'pure decor'. Before 1965, both Ramón and Lupe had had success with this type of work, and Lupe was already an accomplished weaver, but Ramón was to turn the yarn painting into a two-dimensional narrative and visionary artform, as Furst recounts:
“But one day in the summer of 1965, with a little prodding from this writer and Padre Ernesto, yarn painting took a new, radical turn, from puro adorno to pictorial narrative. Why not use his art, we asked Ramón, to illustrate his stories and his vision? Puzzled at first, Ramón, who was then well into self-training as a shaman, produced a yarn painting two days later [The Soul's Arrival In The Village Of The Deceased] that went with a story of the journey of the soul after death...”
As part of his 'completion' as a shaman, Ramón led several pilgrimages to Wirikuta for the famous Peyote Hunt, and although it is not certain whether by the time of his death he had completed the full six pilgrimages usually required to attain the full status of mara'akáme, MacLean reports that even from his first pilgrimage, he developed shamanic abilities very quickly. Furst states however that he completed his training in 1968.
Ramón and Lupe met as migrant labourers in Nayarit, married in the late 1940s and moved to Guadalajara in 1961, where they met the Franciscan Padre Ernesto and began selling traditionally-made crafts through the Basilica of Zapopan where the priest lived. By the mid 1960s, Ramón and Lupe had met American anthropologists Peter T Furst and Barbara G. Myerhoff, and the four began an inter-cultural collaboration that was to propel them into academic notability.
Furst says that previously, Huichol people had tended to use yarn painting as as a decorative tool for items like bowls, or as a folk art, using Huichol motifs with no particular significance that Ramón called puro adorno 'pure decor'. Before 1965, both Ramón and Lupe had had success with this type of work, and Lupe was already an accomplished weaver, but Ramón was to turn the yarn painting into a two-dimensional narrative and visionary artform, as Furst recounts:
“But one day in the summer of 1965, with a little prodding from this writer and Padre Ernesto, yarn painting took a new, radical turn, from puro adorno to pictorial narrative. Why not use his art, we asked Ramón, to illustrate his stories and his vision? Puzzled at first, Ramón, who was then well into self-training as a shaman, produced a yarn painting two days later [The Soul's Arrival In The Village Of The Deceased] that went with a story of the journey of the soul after death...”
The Soul's Arrival In The Village Of The Deceased, Ramón Medina Silva, 60cm x 60cm, 1965
Fowler Museum of Cultural History
Fowler Museum of Cultural History
This artwork eventually became part of a four-image narrative arc on the reciprocity between the living and the dead, fertility and continuity in Huichol thought, and Ramón's new painting style met with immediate success: “From then on until his untimely death in 1971, every yarn painting he created – and there were many dozens – was an illustation of a myth or vision.”
From the outset, Ramón used the Huichol word nieríka (plural, nieríkate) to refer to his new narrative yarn paintings, a word with many layers of meanings “connected with the spiritual and the realm of deities and ancestors... It can be understood as mirror, likeness, face, aspect, image of Otherworlds, and conversely as the doorway or portal into 'non-ordinary reality', the realm of the divine, creation and transformation.”
Schaefer (through MacLean) also reports that nieríka can refer to a person's predestined skill or knowledge, and that almost any object that symbolises or manifests the sacred or the supernatural can be considered as nieríka, from ancient rock art to a shaman's basket, from offerings and votive bowls to mirrors and images of deities. Furst adds that “...from the moment the yarn painting ceased to be merely décor and... began to mirror the sacred myths and the artist's visions, it joined the exalted company of nierikate.”
Furst and Myerhoff soon arranged an exhibition for Ramón's work at the UCLA Museum of Ethnic Arts in 1968, the first time Huichol art had been shown outside of Mexico. Ramón and Lupe went to Los Angeles to attend the opening. MacLean reports something of his presence on the trip:
“Myerhoff took them to a department store and found that all eyes went to Ramón, even though he was dressed in American clothes: 'He had a presence that was extraordinary... the glance of kings... There are people who have this sense of another realm, and they moved differently through this realm because of it'.”
From the outset, Ramón used the Huichol word nieríka (plural, nieríkate) to refer to his new narrative yarn paintings, a word with many layers of meanings “connected with the spiritual and the realm of deities and ancestors... It can be understood as mirror, likeness, face, aspect, image of Otherworlds, and conversely as the doorway or portal into 'non-ordinary reality', the realm of the divine, creation and transformation.”
Schaefer (through MacLean) also reports that nieríka can refer to a person's predestined skill or knowledge, and that almost any object that symbolises or manifests the sacred or the supernatural can be considered as nieríka, from ancient rock art to a shaman's basket, from offerings and votive bowls to mirrors and images of deities. Furst adds that “...from the moment the yarn painting ceased to be merely décor and... began to mirror the sacred myths and the artist's visions, it joined the exalted company of nierikate.”
Furst and Myerhoff soon arranged an exhibition for Ramón's work at the UCLA Museum of Ethnic Arts in 1968, the first time Huichol art had been shown outside of Mexico. Ramón and Lupe went to Los Angeles to attend the opening. MacLean reports something of his presence on the trip:
“Myerhoff took them to a department store and found that all eyes went to Ramón, even though he was dressed in American clothes: 'He had a presence that was extraordinary... the glance of kings... There are people who have this sense of another realm, and they moved differently through this realm because of it'.”
Ramón working on the yarn painting 'How The Scorpion Came Into The World'
and Lupe ritually preparing the painting for completion. Peter T. Furst
and Lupe ritually preparing the painting for completion. Peter T. Furst
Ramón returned to Mexico and continued making yarn paintings and leading pilgrimages to Wirikuta, the sacred primordial landscape of the Huichol people in the Zacatecas Highlands where the peyote grows. Sadly, however, the life of this talented artist was cut short when he was murdered in a brawl on June 23, 1971, having entered a drunken and unruly party in order to rescue two Huichol girls who he had been told were being held in the house in semi-captivity. Thus was the light of a visionary simultaneously traditional and innovative ended.
What, then, of Ramón's body of work, which survived him and allowed his visions to be communicated to the wider world, for what purpose was it created, and how does it compare to the wider Huichol sphere of experience?
Myerhoff narrates that, for the Huichol, “...it is not proper to tell others one's peyote visions unless one is a mara'akáme. Only the latter's visions are intended to convey religious information... The ordinary [person's] visions are for beauty's sake alone, intensely private and spiritual but less sacred than those of the mara'akáme, whose privilege and duty it is to share his messages in great detail.”
Thus we see that for shamans like Ramón, communicating their visions was an important task, and his innovation of doing so visually allowed the audience not merely to imagine but to visually experience the essence of his vision. Just as the shaman enters the Otherworld through a portal called nieríka, so the viewer can also enter through the yarn painting, also called nieríka. Myerhoff also recognised that the knowledge of Huichol culture she learned from Ramón, and by implication the subject matter of his yarn paintings, was heavily coloured by his status as a shaman and unlikely to have been shared by the typical Huichol.
The images reflect this – Tatewarí, our Grandfather Fire, the ancestral embodiment of, and teacher to, the shaman features commonly, as do expressions of devotion to hikuri the sacred peyote and journeys into the Otherworldly village of the dead. Offering pieces, or images that venerate the subject in a sacred manner are also seen as well as visionary works. The visual style is strongly dictated by Huichol interpretations of the effects of peyote vision: we see figures surrounded by glowing colours and vibrant lines of magical power emanating from sacred personages and plants. Shamans engage in communion with deities, whose form (particularly Tatewarí) seems to be in constant movement and transformation.
What, then, of Ramón's body of work, which survived him and allowed his visions to be communicated to the wider world, for what purpose was it created, and how does it compare to the wider Huichol sphere of experience?
Myerhoff narrates that, for the Huichol, “...it is not proper to tell others one's peyote visions unless one is a mara'akáme. Only the latter's visions are intended to convey religious information... The ordinary [person's] visions are for beauty's sake alone, intensely private and spiritual but less sacred than those of the mara'akáme, whose privilege and duty it is to share his messages in great detail.”
Thus we see that for shamans like Ramón, communicating their visions was an important task, and his innovation of doing so visually allowed the audience not merely to imagine but to visually experience the essence of his vision. Just as the shaman enters the Otherworld through a portal called nieríka, so the viewer can also enter through the yarn painting, also called nieríka. Myerhoff also recognised that the knowledge of Huichol culture she learned from Ramón, and by implication the subject matter of his yarn paintings, was heavily coloured by his status as a shaman and unlikely to have been shared by the typical Huichol.
The images reflect this – Tatewarí, our Grandfather Fire, the ancestral embodiment of, and teacher to, the shaman features commonly, as do expressions of devotion to hikuri the sacred peyote and journeys into the Otherworldly village of the dead. Offering pieces, or images that venerate the subject in a sacred manner are also seen as well as visionary works. The visual style is strongly dictated by Huichol interpretations of the effects of peyote vision: we see figures surrounded by glowing colours and vibrant lines of magical power emanating from sacred personages and plants. Shamans engage in communion with deities, whose form (particularly Tatewarí) seems to be in constant movement and transformation.
Three Sacred Peyotes, Ramón Medina Silva, 60cm x 60cm, date unknown
Three peyote seen in vision, depicted in X-ray style with their roots and the button showing,
and emanating glowing rays of magical power. Peter T. Furst
Three peyote seen in vision, depicted in X-ray style with their roots and the button showing,
and emanating glowing rays of magical power. Peter T. Furst
Ramón's work is filled with imageries that the Huichol believe only the mara'akáme can see, but his yarn paintings did not necessarily record individual visionary experiences, as MacLean points out:
“The idea that paintings are based on dreams and visions is a simplified interpretation of the Huichol concept of shamanic inspiration in art... [Huichol] artists themselves were less interested in whether a particular painting was the product of a particular dream, vision or other form of inspiration; instead they considered the artist’s heart-soul-memory (called iyari in Huichol) to be the most important factor in making art. If the iyari was open and in communication with the gods, then the art was shamanically inspired.”
Furst narrates how Ramón used the term kupuri iyari, meaning approximately 'heart and soul', although kupuri refers more to the soul that leaves the body after death (or to the travelling soul of the shaman) whereas iyari connotes a life-essence or memory which returns to the earth. Here, then is something of an authentically Huichol way of viewing these artworks: not as individual visions or simply as expressive images, but as open portals, nieríka, of experience into the shamanic world-beyond-sight communicated through the heart-and-travelling soul of a 'completed' shaman.
There is something in this notion of kupuri iyari which resonates with the perceptions of many contemporary visionary artists – to create holistic shimmering portals rather than mere pictures – and I suspect the concept is not confined solely to Huichol tradition. Whether modern Western culture can create a space for such sacred/interactive subtlety in artistic endeavours (that is to say, to move beyond simple amazement at something exotic or esoteric and even to transcend admiration for detailed craft) remains to be seen. I believe that a wider appreciation of the self-evident authenticity and honesty of purpose residing in Ramón's work would certainly aid many in coming to a deeper – or rather, archaic – understanding of what art is really for.
“The mara'akáme, we call him Tatewarí. He is Tatewarí, he who leads us... It is the mara'akáme who directs everything. He is the one who listens in his dream, with his power and knowledge. He speaks to Tatewarí... who tells him everything, how it must be...”
- Ramón Medina Silva, Huichol shaman, visionary artist, luminary
“The idea that paintings are based on dreams and visions is a simplified interpretation of the Huichol concept of shamanic inspiration in art... [Huichol] artists themselves were less interested in whether a particular painting was the product of a particular dream, vision or other form of inspiration; instead they considered the artist’s heart-soul-memory (called iyari in Huichol) to be the most important factor in making art. If the iyari was open and in communication with the gods, then the art was shamanically inspired.”
Furst narrates how Ramón used the term kupuri iyari, meaning approximately 'heart and soul', although kupuri refers more to the soul that leaves the body after death (or to the travelling soul of the shaman) whereas iyari connotes a life-essence or memory which returns to the earth. Here, then is something of an authentically Huichol way of viewing these artworks: not as individual visions or simply as expressive images, but as open portals, nieríka, of experience into the shamanic world-beyond-sight communicated through the heart-and-travelling soul of a 'completed' shaman.
There is something in this notion of kupuri iyari which resonates with the perceptions of many contemporary visionary artists – to create holistic shimmering portals rather than mere pictures – and I suspect the concept is not confined solely to Huichol tradition. Whether modern Western culture can create a space for such sacred/interactive subtlety in artistic endeavours (that is to say, to move beyond simple amazement at something exotic or esoteric and even to transcend admiration for detailed craft) remains to be seen. I believe that a wider appreciation of the self-evident authenticity and honesty of purpose residing in Ramón's work would certainly aid many in coming to a deeper – or rather, archaic – understanding of what art is really for.
“The mara'akáme, we call him Tatewarí. He is Tatewarí, he who leads us... It is the mara'akáme who directs everything. He is the one who listens in his dream, with his power and knowledge. He speaks to Tatewarí... who tells him everything, how it must be...”
- Ramón Medina Silva, Huichol shaman, visionary artist, luminary
Selections from Ramón Medina Silva's Visionary Yarn Paintings
It should be noted that I do not own the copyright to the images of Ramón Medina Silva's work herein. Some are owned by the Fowler Museum of Cultural History at UCLA and Peter T. Furst, others collectively by the Huichol people: credit is given where known. I share them here under a Fair Usage policy, with honest intentions that a selection of the visionary work of this inspiring artist can be seen in one place, rather than in various academic texts, and to bring Huichol artforms to a wider (and well-deserved) audience than might otherwise see them.
The Soul's Arrival In The Village Of The Deceased, Ramón Medina Silva, 60cm x 60cm, 1965
Fowler Museum of Cultural History
Fowler Museum of Cultural History
“To get to the beyond, the souls are expected to carry the evidence of their sexual lives, the male bringing vaginas, the female, male organs. These they must fling into the tree of life to knock down fruit... to feed the dead” - Ramón Medina Silva (as reported in Furst)
Tatewarí, Our Grandfather Fire, Ramón Medina Silva,60cm x 60cm, date unknown
Fowler Museum of Cultural History
Fowler Museum of Cultural History
“In my vision, I saw the old fire god with two guardian peyotes, not as a person but as a burst of multi-coloured flames from the ceremonial fire” - Ramón Medina Silva (as reported in Furst)
Tatewarí, Our Grandfather Fire, Ramón Medina Silva,60cm x 60cm, date unknown
Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco.
Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco.
Another image of Tatewarí, which appears to have been among Ramón's favoured subjects. Tatewarí is considered as the First Shaman and the greatest teacher in Huichol cultural experience.
Nieríka for the Deified Sun, Ramón Medina Silva,62cm x 58cm, 1966
Fowler Museum of Cultural History
Fowler Museum of Cultural History
Tayaupá, Our Father Sun, attended by the double-headed sky goddess Our Mother Young Eagle, two deer representing the sacred peyote cactus, and a maize plant with other deities.
The Veneration of Peyote in Wirikuta, Ramón Medina Silva, 60cm x 60cm, date unknown
Fowler Museum of Cultural History
Fowler Museum of Cultural History
A sacred peyote button being venerated, and pierced by arrows with which the shaman hunts and catches the cactus in the manner of hunting deer. A second version of this artwork was created by Guadalupe de la Cruz Ríos after Ramón's death.
Left: Title Unknown, Ramón Medina Silva, 60cm x 60cm, date unknown
Right: How One Person Received A Huichol Name, Ramón Medina Silva, 60cm x 60cm, date unknown
Right: How One Person Received A Huichol Name, Ramón Medina Silva, 60cm x 60cm, date unknown
The left-hand image shows Barbara Myerhoff receiving her name from the female deity Utuanaka (Our Mother Maize) in Ramón's vision during a pilgrimage to Wirikuta. Her Huichol name is Tsinurawe, the tufts of fuzz in the centre of a peyote button.
Two works attributed to Ramón Medina Silva.
Phoebe A. Hearst Museum of Anthropology at the University of Berkeley
Phoebe A. Hearst Museum of Anthropology at the University of Berkeley
The work on the left appears to be another 'naming' vision, while the one on the right may refer to a dance between shamans in an Otherworldly locale. Dates and titles unknown.
Attributed to Ramón Medina Silva. Date and title unknown.
A group of pilgrims dance around Tatewarí, the sacred fire during a vision in Wirikuta. The style of this artwork is more complex than Ramón's other works, and the use of concentric lines rather than flat colour in the background may indicate the attribution is misplaced.
The Five Sacred Colours of Maize, 58cm x 58cm, Guadalupe de la Cruz Ríos, date unknown
“The deer, the peyote, the maize of five colours, all that you have seen there in Wirikuta, when we go to hunt the peyote – these are beautiful. They are beautiful because they are right” - Ramón Medina Silva (as reported in Myerhoff)
Bibliography
The Amica Library, Ramón Medina Silva, How One Person Received Their Huichol Name, url: http://www.davidrumsey.com/amica/amico871704-44056.html , retrieved January 2013
Joseph Campbell, Historical Atlas of World Mythology, Vol II: The Way of the Seeded Earth, Part 3: Mythologies of the Primitive Planters: The Middle and Southern Americas, Harpers & Row Perennial Library, 1989
Dhushara (Chris King), Genesis of Eden: A Tribute to Ramón Medina Silva, Carlos the Coyote and Maria Sabina, url: http://www.dhushara.com/book/genaro/genaro.htm , retrieved August 2010
Peter T. Furst, Visions of a Huichol Shaman, University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, 2003
Joan Halifax, Shamanic Voices: A Survey of Visionary Narratives, Penguin Arkana, 1979
Hope MacLean, Huichol Yarn Paintings, shamanic art and the global marketplace, Studies in Religion / Sciences Religieuses, Vol. 32/3, 2003
Hope MacLean, The Shaman’s Mirror: Visionary Art of the Huichol, University of Texas Press, 2012
Sandy McIntosh and Randy Stark, Conjuring Brujos: Did don Juan and don Genaro Exist?, Part 3 An interview with Barbara G. Myerhoff, url: http://sustainedaction.org/Explorations/conjuring_brujos_pt_3.htm, retrieved August 2010
Barbara G. Myerhoff, Peyote Hunt: The Sacred Journey of the Huichol Indians, Cornell University Press, 1974
Barbara G. Myerhoff (trans.) and Ramón Medina Silva, How the Names Are Changed on the Peyote Journey, url: http://nagualli.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/Ramón-medina-silva-how-names-are.html , retrieved January 2014
Richard Evans Schultes, Albert Hoffman and Christian Rätsch, Plants of the Gods: Their Sacred, Healing and Hallucinogenic Powers, Healing Arts Press, 2001
Joseph Campbell, Historical Atlas of World Mythology, Vol II: The Way of the Seeded Earth, Part 3: Mythologies of the Primitive Planters: The Middle and Southern Americas, Harpers & Row Perennial Library, 1989
Dhushara (Chris King), Genesis of Eden: A Tribute to Ramón Medina Silva, Carlos the Coyote and Maria Sabina, url: http://www.dhushara.com/book/genaro/genaro.htm , retrieved August 2010
Peter T. Furst, Visions of a Huichol Shaman, University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, 2003
Joan Halifax, Shamanic Voices: A Survey of Visionary Narratives, Penguin Arkana, 1979
Hope MacLean, Huichol Yarn Paintings, shamanic art and the global marketplace, Studies in Religion / Sciences Religieuses, Vol. 32/3, 2003
Hope MacLean, The Shaman’s Mirror: Visionary Art of the Huichol, University of Texas Press, 2012
Sandy McIntosh and Randy Stark, Conjuring Brujos: Did don Juan and don Genaro Exist?, Part 3 An interview with Barbara G. Myerhoff, url: http://sustainedaction.org/Explorations/conjuring_brujos_pt_3.htm, retrieved August 2010
Barbara G. Myerhoff, Peyote Hunt: The Sacred Journey of the Huichol Indians, Cornell University Press, 1974
Barbara G. Myerhoff (trans.) and Ramón Medina Silva, How the Names Are Changed on the Peyote Journey, url: http://nagualli.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/Ramón-medina-silva-how-names-are.html , retrieved January 2014
Richard Evans Schultes, Albert Hoffman and Christian Rätsch, Plants of the Gods: Their Sacred, Healing and Hallucinogenic Powers, Healing Arts Press, 2001
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