works
El Rey Blanco (ongoing)
hearth
zines
A cinq cents métres de l’effondrement
Arriver au port et attendre que la ville s’éveille
Tout ce qui pend d’un fil
Pianos en Arabia
about
contact
‘El Rey Blanco’ (The White King) is a documentary project that proposes a conversation on colonialism and extractivism on the South American continent.
During the Spanish colonial occupation of the continent, the hill called Potosi, located in present-day Bolivia, known as the largest silver deposit in history, was exploited and emptied. The extraited metal financed the expansion and domination of the Spanish Empire for more than 250 years.
Separated by 140 km from this hill we found the northern point of the so-called Lithium Triangle, an area that extends through Bolivia, Argentina and Chile and which concentrates 65% of the world's reserves of this whitish metal, also known as ‘white gold’, crucial for the manufacture of rechargeable electric batteries. This area is presented as the largest lithium deposit in the world and has a crucial geopolitical role in our time.
Two triangular shapes: a hill and a zone delimited by three geographic points.
According to a legend forged in the second decade of the 16th century, by navigating upstream the river known as the ‘Rio de la Plata’, one would reach a region ruled by a wealthy monarch known as ‘The White King’, where were lying, among other treasures, a hill made entirely of silver.
Nowadays it is believed that the hill of the legend refers to the hill of Potosi, as for the White King, his whereabouts have remained a mistery.
Following the path of the colonists and with a strong oneiric component, the project invites to go in search of the mythical White King and proposes a parallelism between these two metallic triangles which, each in its own time, are exploited and emptied by foreign interest.
“Open Veins” duo show at PhMuseum Lab (05 Dec 2024 - 23 Jan 2025) along with Sarah Schneider and Stella Meyer, curated by Camilla Marrese and Giuseppe Oliverio. Credits : Rosa Lacavalla - PhMuseum
“The Lithium Triangle worth a Potosi”
5 pure silver coins - 6.67 g each.
Paris, France, 2024 - 1/1
Inspired by one of the coins minted with silver from the Cerro de Potosi in the same city by the Spanish during the occupation of South America, I have recreated 5 coins totally made in silver that keeps in the face the original minted model, with the year of the presumed discovery of the hill by the aboriginal Diego Huallpa in 1545. In the mint, as if echoing that they are the two faces of the same coin, I reproduce the silhouette of the 5 most important Lithium deposits in Latin America, adding their name and the phrase “Vale un Potosi” which in Hispanic voice refers to something that contains an extraordinary wealth. In low relief, each coin is crossed by lines, which when put together, form a triangle, making reference to the fact that, The Lithium Triangle is worth a Potosi.
“Paisaje N°1” - 20 x 25 cm
Lithium-Silver Wet Plate reproduction.
2024
This reproduction, of an intervened territory, is made with the wet collodion technique, in which silver salts and lithium salts (the two main metals of the project) were used to reproduce the image.
Showcased on:
FISHEYE
PhMuseum
Little Stories x Diversion Studio
PhMuseum Lab
Der_Greif x Rencontres d’Arles - Screening “Face to Face” - Rencontres d’Arles, 2024