Roof garden, dandelion plants, rubber and mixed media Installation, Delfina Foundation.
Latex is the basic ingredient of natural rubber and the production of many industrial products from cars to small machine parts to seals depends on its transformation. The current rush towards the planting of rubber trees instead of subsistance crops is threatening local ecosystems.
Map of recent rubber tree plantations (National Geographics, 2016).
The search for alternative rubber sources has a long history, from the spectacular failure of the Fordlandia plantations to current experiments with marine substitute. In this context latex-rich Dandelion is being groomed by industry as a possible latex rubber supply of choice.
As part of the Delfina Foundation Residency Thomas Pausz has extended his study of the Dandelion to intersect with the history of Alternative Rubber Production. created a Dandelion Rubber Rooftop garden to harvest latex from 500 Taraxacum Kokh-Zaghiz Dandelions, in the aim of producing a car tyre, but failed and only managed to produce a rubber band.
The installation Golden Rubber shpws the process of this failed attempt and the research in the history of alternative rubber production.