Alberto Hartleben “EL NAWAL”

I am originally from Guatemala, but my journey with tattooing started 9 years ago in Brazil, where I also began my spiritual path. I have since traveled the world to continue growing as a person and an artist, but I feel that I am always carrying something from my ancestors, the Mayans. I have always aimed to know more about ancestral cultures, so for several years I traveled through the American continent, where I was able to learn more about its tribes: their arts, rituals, and their customs.

In the Mayan culture, tattooing was a ritual. Warriors, shamans, governors, and the upper classes of the civilization were the ones who got tattooed. The pre-hispanic tattoo is composed of geometric shapes, straight lines, or taps that were of great significance. I’ve always felt like a had this big connection with something, and many of my clients have felt this connection with my art. I believe tattoo is still a way of transformation and expression, as it was in many ancient cultures.

I am also very curious about the medicines of people. Experiencing and learning about it with the people allowed me to evolve as an human being and had a great impact on me, also changing my art in many ways.

Lately, I use microdoses of psychedelics to find something or awaken something that sometimes we struggle in finding. Each person has its own purpose, and this is what I want people to see in my lines. Something that many people identify with. For it to be like a universal DNA. Those lines exist everywhere: you can see them in nature and have your own way of how you see them, but I simply want them to mean life, like a thread. It is something very fine but with many connections like our brain, many ups and downs like life and the rhythm of the heart. People find comfort in this. That is what I seek to be able to transmit: something that makes sense, for them and for me, a sense of peace and harmony.