Llontop

Anonymous Ensemble’s Llontop celebrates Andean culture and language and features the song-poems of Quechua poet Irma Alvarez-Ccoscco. The work is a three-part experience: an interactive installation of Peruvian heirlooms, a live-film performance for both in-person and virtual audiences, and a lively conversation with the artists about the work and Quechua empowerment. The Llontop installation invites each attendee to use their own phone or a provided mobile device to look more deeply into cultural artifacts through innovative technologies. As the audience moves through the environment, they digitally commune with the heirlooms and experience a personalized audio journey through the creation of Llontop, which helps contextualize the live poetry performance that follows. A retelling of colonization from an Indigenous perspective, Irma Alvarez-Ccoscco’s haunting song-poems are set in specific moments of Quechua history—spanning from the brutal conquest of the Incas in 1532, through the eighteenth-century Indigenous uprising of Túpac Amaru II, and into the present-day resurgence of Quechua empowerment. The poems are performed using Anonymous Ensemble’s signature live-film aesthetic, with projections, live music, and a simultaneous livestream of the performance for remote Zoom audiences. Each performance is followed by a conversation between the Llontop artists and audiences both in real space and across the Andean diaspora. Ultimately, Llontop is a powerful community experience that bridges the divides between North and South America and honors the people of the Andes—their language, their culture, their history, and their future.