Tierras raras (Rare Earths)

Tierras raras [Rare Earths] seems a beautiful way to describe our sinister world. A way of bestowing mystery, even mythology, on what could be seen as a catastrophe. It is the poetic exercise, the magic of naming by a Russian chemist who grouped together some strange minerals, adding them to the periodic table when time was still measured in centuries, without imagining that these minerals would be the staple food of the technology industry in his future and our present, and that the words he chose would sum up, like a spell or exorcism, a whole era.

Beauty survives destruction with all its fragility intact. Like Anna Tsing’s mushrooms, the wild animals of Chernobyl or the free electricity that could light the whole of Mexico City. If we dig into the earth – with our fingernails, drilling machines or special trowels – we will find rubbish, the world’s excrement, the scatological traces of history: household waste, mining waste, prehistoric tools and obsolete computers, body parts, the ruins of temples destroyed in wars, icons sacrificed by spiritual enemies. Tierras raras is an image, a glimpse of this condensation of time. The dance of the subsoil, of that which decomposes and feeds the world. The dance of this original violence.

Dance Luz Arcas, La Merce, Danielle Mesquita, Javiera Paz, Raquel Sánchez

Stage direction, choreography, stage design Luz Arcas

Singing and vocals Tomás de Perrate Raquel Sánchez

Lighting Jorge Colomer

Sound design Xabier Erkizia

Dramaturgy Luz Arcas Pedro G Romero

Technical direction Cristina L. Bolívar

Photo and video Virginia Rota

Dressing Andrea Otin

Artistic support  Victoria Aimé

Graphic design María Peinado

Assistant director and executive production Fernando Jariego

Technical crew Jose Espigares, (lighting)  Pablo Contreras (sound)

Production coordinator Alberto Núñez

Production director Alex Foulkes