The Falling Sky by Raphael Alves

‘When all the shamans have died, I think the sky will fall. (...) The forest will be destroyed and the weather will be dark. If there are no more shamans to hold up the sky, it will not stay in place. The whites are just ingenious, they ignore shamanism, they are not the ones who will be able to hold up the sky (...) Not only the Yanomami are going to die, but all the whites too. No one is going to escape the fall of the sky.’ David Kopenawa, shaman and leader of the Yanomami people of the Amazon rainforest.

The Yanomami Indigenous Territory occupies parts of the states of Roraima and Amazonas in Brazil, and is marked by illegal mining, malaria and malnutrition. In January 2023, indigenous and socio-environmental entities denounced an ongoing humanitarian tragedy in the area.