Hand Painted Alebrije Turtle Wood Sculpture from Mexico, "Psychedelic Turtle"

With colorful flowers blossoming on its shell, this turtle captivates with psychedelic artistry. Zeny and Reyna craft this endearing alebrije sculpture with techniques inherited from their parents. They carve a found piece of copal wood into the statuette and proceed to paint it with hand crafted artistry.

Alebrijes are a fairly recent Mexican art form, attributed to Pedro Linares. Unconscious due to illness in 1936, he was presumed near death and yet his dreams were extremely vivid. He tells of a place where all was peaceful and quiet until all of a sudden there appeared a lion with an eagle's head, a rooster with bull's horns and a donkey with butterfly wings. They kept screeching "alebrije, alebrije!" and Ricardo began running away. He encountered a man who told him it was not yet his time to be there are and he should continue running towards the exit. In this dream Pedro climbed out of a window and regained consciousness. He made paper replicas of these creatures to show everyone, and soon others began to craft other "monster-like" creatures in bright colors.