El Dorado – a paradisical place of longing? Sabine Köhler and Heiki Ikkola, the founders of the Dresden theatre group Cie. Freaks und Fremde, broke this spell two years ago. At that time gold was the goal of their inspiring research voyage to the Colombian high country near Bogotá, and the resulting production. Five places in five countries of South America bear the alluring name, and it’s even attached to the Colombian capital’s airport and the golden age of the nation’s football league. There are also 13 US localities and naturally a number of films and institutions that revel in the name. But we have to be specific here, even with spaces: the piece is called Eldorado and references a fictitious country as a metaphor. The Spanish conquistadors searched for it avidly almost five hundred years ago, believing the myth-shrouded cinnamon forests to lie in various places and in different configurations: as a temple, as a drowned city, as a kingdom – hidden somewhere between Amazonas and Peru.
So how do you extract Carbon – the title of the new play by Cie. Freaks und Fremde – from El Dorado, Spanish for “the golden one”? By showing how today, South...