MISSION STATEMENT:

CHOKECHAKA is a Quechua word from the native Andean language and translates to Golden Bridge in english. CHOKECHAKA/GOLDEN BRIDGE is dedicated to cultural, social, environmental and humanitarian enrichment by sharing skills, knowledge, traditions, building community and forming collaborations. We believe in the inspirational power of cultural exchange. By celebrating spirit, compassion, and reciprocity together, we form alliances and strengthen connections with all our relations.

OUR GOALS:

TO CELEBRATE and SHARE TRADITIONS: We value opportunities to preserve, honor, and share traditional ways, and by so doing gain insights into the places where our beliefs, needs, desires, and values meet and diverge. By sharing the taste, feel, smell, and sounds of one another’s lives, deep connections are established.

TO STRENGTHEN COMMUNITY and FORM COLLABORATIONS: Based on mutual respect and compassion, we seek to discover one another’s strengths, weaknesses, needs, and concerns, and to share skills, and knowledge that can enrich the lives of all.

TO LEARN and TO TEACH: Based on mutual support and guidance, we seek to exchange wisdom with people of all ages in an ongoing effort to create a healthier, more peaceful, just world.

TO INSPIRE ENGAGEMENT: Through collective stewardship and shared responsibility, and by encouraging one another to participate, everyone becomes an empowered agent of personal, social, and ecological transformation.

WHO WE ARE:

Adolfo Ibanez Ayerve is a musician and actor from the city of Cusco in Southern Peru. He studied charango (a traditional guitar-like instrument) with Julio Benavente Diaz, one of the last great masters of the t’ipi (finger picking) technique. In Adolfo's work, he shares the tradition of music, storytelling, and other forms of creative expression passed down, to keep alive a body of collective wisdom that can help us to understand our past, discover ways to live harmoniously in the present, and navigate into the future with empathy and reverence.

Jennifer Zackin is a cultural worker inspired by meeting people, experiencing traditions, and sharing a relationship to the landscape in India, Cambodia, Japan, Thailand, Taiwan, Turkey, Greece, Czech Republic, Hungary, Bolivia, and Peru. She creates public art that invites community and collaborative engagement. Her drawing, sculpture and installation work highlights nature's patterns and enhances our sense of interconnectedness through reverence and stewardship. Her work has been exhibited in museums, galleries, and outdoor public venues around the world.

Jennifer and Adolfo met in Cusco in 2004 and married in 2007.
They are based in Woodstock NY and Cusco, Peru