There is no East,
There may never be a Sun
Laila Malik


Oil is a deadly pearl.

Sun Eaters is a contemporary folk dance about the mythological origins of petrol, about the long cycles of violence that it initiates, steeped in wars, dangerous gods and death poems. It is inspired by petro-magic, petro-horror poetry and the tradition of vengeful dances.

If Oil is an immense, collective, anonymous material, it can be accessed through another similarly collective and anonymous material: folk dance is a perfect device for this purpose. It is alive, unburied, incarnated, and it waves back at us. Oil is a vicious poem hidden in darkness.

Sun Eaters blends dances from Norway, Brittany and West Asia. It is drenched in doom metal, pre-islamic iconography, levantine maqams and Norwegian curse tunes. Sun Eaters twists and betrays what it summons, and rekindles with the cruelty of oil to incarnate its deadly, seductive smile.


The piece uses sources from doom metal, pre-Islamic iconography, Levantine maqams, west asian death poetry, and cursed Norwegian tunes. It twists and betrays what it summons, and rekindles with the cruelty of folk to incarnate its deadly, seductive smile.


Sources:
Sun Eaters is based on Cyclonopedia by Reza Negarestani, associating pre-islamic iconography to analyze our political landscape, the studies of mesopotamian rituals concerning snakes, the cult of Pazuzu, the horror poetry of Aase Berg, the mythical poems of Laila Malik, the description of bodies in Hassan Blasim’s novels, the movie The House is Black by Forough Farrokhzad, and living documentation of exalted folk dances from Norway, Brittany and West Asia (Iran and Palestine).