Zapatilla de Venus

This painting is dedicated to Phragmipedium kovachii, a rare magenta orchid discovered in Peru in 2002 and threatened by botanical poaching. Its beauty, instead of protecting it, turned it into an object of possession.

With this work, I enter a quieter part of the series Amazzonia. Indigenous Stories. I do not only portray the faces, bodies, and resistance of Amazonian peoples, but also what surrounds them: plants, flowers, water, land, and the fragile habitat that holds their life and memory.

In this painting, the flower does not appear as a trophy, but as a living presence within the forest. It is an image of splendor and fragility, an invitation to look at nature not as something to conquer, but as something to protect.

Not everything beautiful belongs to us.