I went looking for the real Peru — my ancestral truth through movement
I’m Cynthia Paniagua — a Queens-raised dancer, choreographer and educator of Peruvian and Nuyorican heritage, born to a Peruvian mother and a Puerto Rican father. For over twenty years I’ve danced, lived and researched in Peru, learning from the living masters of our traditions.
I know the double and triple consciousness of the diaspora — the feeling of being in-between. The truth is somos de aquí y de allá.
We make up an important part of the mosaic of Peruvian culture. How we represent, connect to and value our heritage matters — and dance is the language our ancestors used to resist, connect, thrive and empower themselves. Y nadie te quita lo bailado.
Twenty years, coast to Andes to Amazon
A Fulbright, then the living masters
After Hunter, a Fulbright Scholarship took me to Peru — to “know the real Peru, my ancestral truth through movement.” I journeyed the coast, Andes and Amazon, studying and living with the living masters of Peruvian dance.
A documentary, premiered at Lincoln Center
My journey was filmed for the documentary “Soy Andina,” which premiered at Lincoln Center and went on to earn festival awards. The U.S. Embassy then invited me back to Peru for its largest-ever cultural exchange tour.
Choreographing across two worlds
I choreographed and performed for “El Vuelo del Cóndor” in Lima (alongside Cirque du Soleil artists), then created “Paukartanpu” with Kusikay Theater — an homage to Andean ritual dance, the first of its kind in Cusco.
Dance as resistance
I completed my M.A. at NYU with a focus on dance and politics in Peru, returning to the Amazon to work with native leaders — performing resistance through the arts and documenting the fight for territorial sovereignty.
A Nuyorican stage
I served as Dance Education Coordinator at BAAD (Bronx Academy of Arts and Dance), Teaching Artist for Ballet Hispánico, and a member of Bombazo Dance Company — creating Latina collaborative works like “BX Rated” and “Shadowlands.”
The United Nations Symphony Orchestra
I was commissioned as the UNSO’s first-ever choreographer for “El Cóndor Pasa — Andean Hope,” created for the 18th UN Forum on Indigenous Issues.
In the Heights
I was featured in the film adaptation of “In the Heights” (Lin-Manuel Miranda, directed by Jon M. Chu).
Dance Your Ancestors
I founded Kaypacha Dance — channeling 20+ years of relationships and homage to my mentors in Peru into a program that reconnects the diaspora to their roots through the medicine of our dances.
My lens is focused on uplifting Indigenous women — and the crucial role they play in our cultural, spiritual and social survival.
Kaypacha — the realm of action, here on earth
Kaypacha is a Quechua word: the power of the here and now, the realm where the ancestors’ legacy is made real through action. As part of my Andean spiritual and cultural practice, my mission is to express the legacy of my ancestors through dance — to actively decolonize the stage and the archive, and create visibility for the voices too long kept at its margins.
Where the work is rooted
The training that grounds this practice, and the stages and screens that have carried it.
Training & credentials
Selected work & recognition
The wisdom is in your body. Your body is connected to an abundant intelligence passed through the elders. Dance, and it will come. Go get your birthright.