Description Traditional Dance of The Tarantula Spider. Ancient Dancers.This is a oil painting, 33x25 inches, made on canvas jute sheet in 2012. This dance represents a hundreds years ancient tradition of the dance of the Tarantula, from a rite that date its roots back to the Greek rites of the Bacchae. It was, and still is, a liberating dance, undertaken mainly by women once a year, and lasts for days. Only on those feast days, women could freedom themselves from the oppression of their lives. The manifestation of this dance, took place in a public square, starting with the rests phase, lying down on the floor. Then, accompanied by the obsessive rhythms of violins and tambourines, they were starting dancing as they were possessed by the evil. From that the believes that they had been bitten form the Tarantula spider. The old female relatives of their families were closely follow them, holding a pillow, to prevent them, the dancers, to bump their head on the stone floor, as the 'bitten' women were often falling on the ground, exhausted still restless, completely out of control, in a total state of trance.This dance was the liberation of cruelty and bitterness of women's lives from a reality of a world ruled by men, and through their body shaken by the madness of three days, women where freedom their souls from the torment of their lives. This is history, anthropological phenomenon, part of our culture of south Italy. Today, this dance is still alive, is a show that attracts many tourists and curious people all around the world. But for us it is something more than a show. Nowadays at the end of August, in the night of The Tarantula, we dance restless for hours (visit my other painting 'Traditional Dance of the Tarantula, Modern Dancer') all night, from sunset to sunrise not to forget, and proudly we still dance to honor our freedom!
Alessandra Andrisani, Palo Alto Member Since March 2013 Artist Statement Alessandra Andrisani was born in Matera, Basilicata, South Italy. The fifth of six sisters, daughter of non-immigrant parents, she herself emigrated to the United States in 2003. She worked as a chef in California for a number of years, then returned to Matera to help a friend open a restaurant. Not fully satisfied, she turned her attention to painting and writing. Needing to settle on a path for her future, but unable to decide which of these three passions she wanted to pursue, she decided to put them together. Thus began this adventure in composing painted recipes in connection with anecdotes of her life. Her paintings are slowly gaining favor with the public and can be sampled with the first chapter (published on amazon) of her first upcoming and unique painted cookbook, which is part of a memoir that relates her childhood in Italy with the celebration of food and the art of living!