THE RUSSIAN PRINCE (PAPOSO CUENTA)

While I was busy constructing an emotional map of Antofagasta in northern Chile, I came across dozens of stories and people, but out of all, I was struck by a local legend. It seems that in the early 1900s, in Paposo, a fishing village between Antofagasta and Taltal, lived a Russian prince who arrived from Europe after the Bolshevik revolution and built his castle there. So I went to Paposo to find out where this story came from and how much truth there was in it. What I found was much more than an old legend.

I conducted extensive archive research and interviewed almost all the inhabitants of Paposo. The Russian prince existed. The oldest still remembered him, although everyone has different memories. What used to be his castle is now a dilapidated shack used as a dormitory by some fishermen from neighbouring villages during the fishing season for congrio (a type of eel).

During a warm evening on the Tropic of Capricorn line, I told this story to Sol, a playwright I met in Antofagasta, and showed her my photos and a few other images I found in the archives. That same evening, the idea of producing a social theatre show in Paposo was born. A year after that decision, we set up a site-specific performance in front of the 'castle' of Paposo, involving the inhabitants, listening to the stories of the elders and hearing the songs of the local school children.