Biography

Giulio Di Sturco's shortlisted projects

2014

Giulio Di Sturco

COCOA WAR

Madagascar is home to some of the world's finest rich orange and red pods of cocoa, increasingly used today by Europe and America's finest chocolatiers. Raw cocoa beans, used to make premium chocolate, have never been in higher demand. A surge in appetite for high-end chocolate sourced from single-origin growers has created a frenzied rush for the "dark gold". For the island's cocoa farmers, the surging demand for chocolate should be transformative, especially after years of poverty, but their newfound livelihoods are under threat from armed bandits running rampant in remote areas, hijacking stores and road shipments of the precious beans that make chocolate. The cacao farmers in Ambanja are living in fear every day. A fear of theft prompts them to store their harvested crop as close to them as possible, with most keeping it in the same room as they sleep in. Gangs do as they please, stealing cacao from the farmers’ houses and from the fields. These gangs even steal unripe cacao from the field, then dig holes in which to ripen it underground. Owners of plantations are obliged to patrol their fields every day and evening to keep crops safe. Cacao is a luxury product, thus the existence of cacao plantations in Ambanja is a source of pride. Gangs make a significant profit from stealing cacao and they gain respect in their local communities because they can now help their families meet their daily needs. Police assaults on gangs are often callous, blistering attacks. They hunt down members of these theft rings from a list of wanted gangs. On the list was Rakotonirina Ferdinand, 33 years old, who was shot dead in his house in Matsaborilava, when he tried to prevent police from entering his house. Ferdinand’s family was shocked by the shooting, and significant tension now exists between the police and the family. The police continue trying to restore security, but the gangs are determined to continue stealing.

2014

Giulio Di Sturco

DEATH OF A RIVER

Five years in the making, I am on the last leg of my Ganges project this year. Exasperating at times it has been a huge struggle for me to decide what to communicate and what to leave out. Everything is happening at once along the Ganges. Climate change is visibly melting the glaciers up in the Himalayas, as the sea level rises and threatens to submerge the sundarbans; salination of the land is posing irreversible damage to fragile ecology along the river. Dams are being constructed to the detriment of the river and the communities that live on its banks. The constant polluting of the waters from domestic, industrial, chemical and biological waste makes disease and death a constant and often casual reminder of our fragility.  I have been challenged spiritually, emotionally and mentally on so many levels by these waters. Every time I return to the Ganges I have to force myself to use the physicality of the work as a way to push through and continue the internal dialogue I have with the world around me. India stirs many emotions within me, imperfect and conflicted my experiences have been beautiful and transient.   The Ganges is a goddess; moody and fierce at times she holds the human beast within her grasp. I have heard so many warnings of ecological disasters on the tip of the horizon and I have witnessed mans unforgiving greed for survival as more new cities cut through this holy river. As the water dances around my fingers, teasing me playfully, I stand within her and surrender. I wonder how long mortals can test the gods.