Throughout their history, the Makuna have withstood the social and environmental stresses inflicted upon them by European arrival, the Amazonian rubber boom at the turn of the century, and a black-market demand for coca leaves during the 1970s and 1980s. Most recently, gold mining is threatening to destroy their hills and forests and to weaken their traditions. Countering this menacing scenario, Makuna evokes the vitality of a culture in which the natural, spiritual, and human worlds are fundamentally united.

In stunning, full-color photographs and an evocative text, Diego Samper and Kaj Århem celebrate the natural surroundings, domestic life, and vibrant rituals of a rainforest people whose cultural future is being jeopardized by outsiders' destruction of their lands.