The Colony

This threepart video is loosely based on nineteenthcentury depictions of a cluster of islands off of the west coast of Peru that are rich in guano a powerful fertilizer Exploring the drama of absurdity greed and human sufferingall for the brown gold of bird excrementthe film revisits three important episodes in the islands infamous history the nineteenthcentury imperial wars between Spain and its former colonies Peru and Chile the horrific fate of the indentured Chinese laborers and the US Guano Act of 1856 that authorized over one hundred claims for uninhabited islands reefs and atolls in the Pacific and Atlantic