Travel Peru, Peru Blog

¨We are too much like oysters observing the sun through the water,
and thinking that thick water the thinnest of air¨.
Herman Melville´s Moby-Dick

Dozens of children fill the Kusikay Theater here in Qosqo with loud voices and laughs even though impatience parents attempt laboriously to keep them calm and quiet because the  presentation is about to begin. Unexpectedly, all the theater´s lights turn off and a muffled silence predominates, only broken at times by the sighs of surprised and frightened kids.  An unrestrained roaring spreads through the entire building as hundreds of puppets and flat cut-out figurines appear on the stage. The play resourcefully mingles clown, pantomime and music in order to tell three short but amazing tales.

The peruvian-canadian theater group El Cantar del Cárabo or the Tawny Owl´s Singing has presented his play ¨Concierto Fugaz para un Sol Dormido¨ in Lima as well in Qosqo. The native canadian Marie-Eve Lefebvre and also the founder of the group says that they are very interested in developing their own theater language by searching and using the ancient technique of the shadow play. You can express an array of things with simple materials and the wise use of light and shadow, claims she.

Their presentation was part of the International Theater Festival held for the second year in the city of Qosqo. This event gathered theater companies from this city as well as from Lima. The local group Intiqchurinkuna which came from the small town of Chinchero, within the Sacred Valley, featured a remarkable legend about the Lake Pitusiray.

On the other hand, one of the most renown companies from Lima is Yuyachkani which was also present in this festival with two plays. This group creates stories based on the lives of native people who have to encounter a new and hard life when they move on to the capital city and suffer the period of guerilla war in Perú. The public also enjoyed the works of the peruvian Colectivo Angeldemonioo and the Teatro del Milenio.

In addition to peruvian theather, this event also featured the plays of international groups from Argentina, Brasil and Chile such as the groups Urutu,Mapuche el Katango, and La Zopenca. The most remarkable point about this festival is that the plays are for all age, child and adult,  and above all they are free entrance. The shows were held in the Kusikay teather as well as the Municipal teather and the Temple of the Sun and it was sponsored by the Arqueologo Hotel.