Upcoming New School Events
"Tarantella, Tarantula," with the Artship Ensemble, directed by Slobodan Dan Paich
Tarantella, Tarantula is a contemporary exploration of dance, music and storytelling that speaks of continuity and passionate age-old practices not alien to our modern needs: a delicate and poignant story. Artship's idiosyncratic style has been described by critics as being at the nexus of dance, theater, cinema and "zen." Tarantella has been employed for centuries by village elders, primarily women, in Italy and elsewhere. The dance's outward purpose is to ward off the negative effects of the poisonous bite of the tarantula spider, but its more general inward purpose is to offer tools to deal with oppression, unrequited love, and longings of the heart that do not have outlets in traditional societies. The performance is not a reconstruction of any particular regional type of Tarantella dance or music, but an immersion in the essence of Tarantella as a poetic framework for the production's narrative. Read more >>
"Actors-dancers bring lost art of physical storytelling to life."
—R. Howard, San Francisco Chronicle
"Why cannot those poisoned by Tarantulas be cured otherwise than by Music?"
—Athanasius Kircher, Rome, 1641
Slobodan Dan Paich is the principal choreographer and artistic director for Artship Dance/Theater, and is the coordinator for Artship Visual Arts & Community/Cultural Commons initiatives. He also served as director of arts and culture on the board of directors of the International Peace Foundation, Berlin & Vienna from 1996 to 2002. Never far from the rehearsal process in the theater, he has taught performing visual arts and architecture at major performing, visual arts and architecture schools and studios in United States, England, Germany and Italy. Paich has received numerous local, state and national awards for his work in bringing arts and culture-making into the community. More info >>
Magna Graeca/Tarantella, S. D. Paich paper for International Conference in Greece on Meaning of Festivals, 2005 click here to read this paper
When: Sunday, August 19 at 3 p.m.
Where: Commonweal Main Office
Art Gallery