Benjamin Pizzaro Bio

Born in Ayacucho, Peru, Benjamin started working with alabaster stone, or “piedra de Huamanga,” at a young age, and quickly gained international recognition. He loves creating religious figures and commissioned nature-themed sculptures. Crafting his distinctive and delicate miniature alabaster nativities also provides his family with reliable and steady work year-round. Now, he and his wife Betina travel once a year to Christmas fairs in Europe to show off his new creations and proudly share their crafts with the world!

Learn more about Benjamin on the blog!

The Pizarro Family of Stone Carvers

Don and Alessandra visited Benjamin Pizzaro's alabaster carving workshop in Ayacucho, Peru in April right before Easter 2017. Benjamin and Bertina make all the normal alabaster nativities in our wholesale collection, so we were excited to have this rare oppotunity to visit. We learned how they have to hand select each rock, cut it carefully and then check carefully for cracks. In bigger pieces an artist sometimes discovers a defect deep inside while they are carving it, therefore you will often see small cracks and other natural stone defects on larger pieces. The rarity of perfect stone makes the larger sculptures even more amazing.