White Gold

White Gold is a restaging of a traditional folk performance from the Cotton growing regions of Central India. The performance takes place every year in the month of May just before the sowing season begins with the arrival of rain in June. For five consecutive nights the ancient tale of Ruru, Suka and Larynx is performed by the farming community in their unique theatrical style.

In the story, Ruru and Suka are two children who are chosen to undertake an epic journey across the Earth to restore their lands that have been disturbed by the untimely landing of an alien Larynx.

White Gold is part of a long term research project about the history of cotton farming in India. Since 1995, 400,000 farmer suicides have taken place in India. The cotton farming community is the worst affected by this wave of suicides that are a result of complex social, economic and political reasons. Cotton was proverbially called White Gold in the commodity market.

Made as Intimidation Tactics with: George Demetriou, Julia van der Putten and Naomi Collier Broms by Agat Sharma

In collaboration with: Laura Boser, Yunus Bilir, Maria Mavridou, Sipan Sezgin Tekin

Advisors: Computational Mama and Marijn Lems