The Amazonian Rubber Boom: “A Heart of Darkness in the Amazon” – Talk with Erna von der Walde

‘The Amazon Rubber Boom: Industrialisation, extractivism, and violence’ has been developed with guest curators Giuliana Borea and Erna von der Walde, and brings together different materials to explore the links between rubber exploitation in the Amazon and its circulation in Europe.

In the second half of the 19th century, a new phase of industrialisation in Europe and the US triggered a demand for rubber that would have tragic consequences for the peoples of the Amazon (1870-1930). It fuelled not only the mass displacement of indigenous people from their original lands, but also their enslavement, along with that of many others, mostly poor peasants seeking a better living in a booming extractive industry. One of the most controversial episodes in the history of rubber is the revelation in the British press —and eventually in a report submitted by Sir Roger Casement to Parliament— of the regime of terror under which rubber was extracted in the Putumayo region on the border between Peru and Colombia. A Peruvian company known in the area as Casa Arana had gone public on the London Stock Exchange under the name of Peruvian Amazon Company with a capital of one million pounds. Its success, as was revealed, was based on a regime of terror that led to the death of thousands of indigenous peoples, of which the Uitoto, Ocaina, Nonuya, Bora, Miraña, Muinane, and Andoque were the most affected.

This violent event has been in the memory of indigenous people and constitutes to this day a defining moment in their history, as can be seen in this exhibition in the powerful images of the indigenous Uitoto artist Santiago Yahuarcani and the Bora-Murui artist Brus Rubio. In dialogue with their work, this show will also include the work of the Newcastle based artist Sarah March. These works will be displayed alongside historical maps, photography, and documents; literature on the rubber exploitation such as José Eustasio Rivera’s La Voragine (The Vortex) and the film El Canto de la Mariposa (The Song of the Butterflies) directed by filmmaker Núria Frigola Torrent about the Yahuarcani´s family, their art, and memory of this tragic episode.