And it seems with my commitment to go back to the jungle in November (2013), I was finally able to finish the painting of Herlinda, which I began in 2011 in honor of Herlinda Agustin Fernandez, a Shipibo Shaman and healer. She was known for her singing of powerful ceremonial healing songs, known as icaros. She passed in late 2010 after my previous trip to the upper Amazon jungle of Peru.

I had the good fortune of meeting Herlinda and her husband Enrique in 2007, at a retreat in Northern New Mexico. I had my first shamanic healings with a Peruvian shaman during the retreat, receiving the blessings of her sacred icaros, as well as Shipibo style shamanic massage and extraction work. The healings were just what I needed, and also the ticket to learning a new way of life offered by the Shipibo.

Herlinda was a powerful healing and singer of sacred icaros, as well as an artisan of the woven clothes and jewelry, and a great sales person! She had the skills of great persuasion to go along with her healing abilities.

This painting of Herlinda is a representation of her magic, and the illumination of light that comes from singing the powerful, healing icaros, or sacred songs. In this image, as she sings, light molecules flow from her hands in the shape of snakes, representing the power of the anaconda, and of the Great Mother healing vine of the soul. Healing light pours from her hands radiating this healing energy outward for all to receive. The leaves surrounding her are a plant known for activating vision.

As the master of singing icaros, Herlinda taught me that we are born as a song, or a pattern of light and energy. These patterns radiate into form and express simultaneously. When we get angry, upset, frustrated, sick or out of balance in any way in our bodies and the world around us, our song gets distorted and needs rebalancing. As Herlinda (or any shaman) sings, she calls to the allies of the plants, the animals, the birds, and the powers of Mother Nature, invoking their sacred healing patterns of light. The songs are sung into the group or individual to bring healing and energies of light to balance and return harmony.

This painting was created not only in honor of Herlinda, but also as a portal to the healing songs of the sacred plants and other allies from the mother jungles.  This painting emanates healing light, and can be worked with consciously as if Herlinda were in the room on the physical plane. She continues to be a powerful healer and ally through the dimensions though she is not incarnated at this time.

I asked Herlinda (psychically) what I most needed to know about this painting and its energy infusion, and she tells me this is a painting of the heart. It is a portal to purification of the heart and soul, and the DNA when engaged with sincerity and humility. The Grandmother will work with and through Herlinda and the portal of this painting to bring her song into the world and expand their patterns into those who wish to heal, who desire to wake up and be filled with light.

Herlinda lives on in our lives even without form of the body as we knew her in this life. She asks if you would like to work with her directly, to contribute back to her people and CSEE by purchasing one of the prints of her that is available now. She wants you to know this is ceremonial art, supporting journeying of the soul, and vibrating just as her songs, to bring healing.