Yanantin

Art in Odd Places, NYC, 2017

A collaboration with Jennifer Zackin and Adolfo Ibáñez Ayerve
Featured in "ART IN ODD PLACES: SENSE 2017"
Curated by Nicolás Dumit Estévez Raful

On Saturday, October 14, 2017, Jennifer Zackin and Adolfo Ibáñez Ayerve created an offering in Jackson Square Park at the intersection of Horatio Street, Greenwich Avenue, and 8th Avenue. The work honored "Yanantin," a Quechua word meaning "two beings, energies, or entities that bring opposition into harmony."

Based on the traditional Andean Despacho Ceremony, this ritual offering expresses gratitude, love, and prayer to the water, earth, mountains, sun, and moon. The offering is crafted using natural materials such as seeds and fresh flowers, which are carefully arranged and infused with intentions. These materials are then returned to nature in the form of a beautifully packaged bundle.

For this performance, the offering was released into a Catskill Mountains tributary that feeds into the Hudson River—a waterway that, like all rivers in the United States, faces environmental challenges from fossil fuel and nuclear energy industries.