Jennifer Mondfrans

Thematic Painter

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Sasha Shulgin

      • oil on wood
      • 19" x 24"
      • 2011

Chemist (b. 1925)

Alexander “Sasha” Shulgin, Ph.D., is a pharmacologist and chemist known for his creation of new psychoactive chemicals. He has synthesized and bioassayed (self-tested) hundreds of psychoactive chemicals, recording his work in four books and more than two hundred papers. In 1967, he was introduced to the possibilities of MDMA (ecstasy) by an undergrad at San Francisco State University. Though Sasha didn’t invent the chemical, he did create a new synthesis process in 1976, which led to hundreds of therapists using the material in therapy.