From 19 July to 2 August , “Dancing the Earth”, the residential workshop dedicated to the study of ritual dances from Southern Italy and the Mediterranean, arrives in Lecce. “Roots” is the title of the special 2025 edition of “Dancing the Earth”, an event promoted by Tarantarte with the artistic direction of Maristella Martella, which this year is co-created and supported by Italea Puglia (Radici di Puglia Aps) – a reality part of the territorial network of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation as part of the “Roots Tourism” program – and carried out in collaboration with the Polo Biblio Museale di Lecce, Puglia Culture, Ura Teatro, Kalimeriti Ambrò-Pedia Association, Liceo Scientifico Da Vinci di Maglie, UASC.
The collaboration with Italea Puglia becomes an important tool to link the practice of traditional dances and the deepening of the popular cultural heritage – on which the residency has always focused – to the theme of Italian emigration. This year’s activities give the opportunity to deepen the “journey” of oral culture outside Italy, the roots and stories of emigrants, the links between the local communities of Puglia and those of Italians and Italodescendants abroad.
From 19 July to 2 August , the spaces of the former Convitto Palmieri in Lecce will thus become a hotbed of creativity, to cross the complex theme of cultural and community “roots” between intensive dance workshops, meetings and cultural exchanges, shows and concerts.
On Thursday 31 July , the final event (free admission) is scheduled, which alongside the return of the residency with choreography by Maristella Martella offers a “sung walk” through the center of Lecce with Ninfa Giannuzzi and the theatrical show “Via” with Fabrizio Saccomanno and Cristina Mileti; in addition, from 19 July to 2 August the exhibition “On the run” by Gianluca Distante can be visited.
The program of Thursday 31 July
On Thursday, July 31 , the return event of Dancing the Earth 2025 opens at 8 p.m. in the atrium of the former Convitto Palmieri with “La strada della voce“, a sung and danced walk led by Ninfa Giannuzzi, accompanied by the Orchestra of the Da Vinci High School of Maglie and the dancers in residence, which will cross the center of Lecce.
A community experience, an artistic caravan to which anyone, meeting her, can freely join: the voice and song of Ninfa Giannuzzi will welcome the melodies of the lands overlooking the Mediterranean, backwards along the thread of history and in a perspective of peace. Next to her, three wind instruments will accompany the journey with the performance of traditional areas. All around, the reverberation of music in the bodies of the dancers, who will return to recite a Mantra – learned during the residency – in Griko, the language that unites Greece and Southern Italy by telling of ancient migrations.
At 9 pm, having landed again at the Convitto Palmieri, the participants in the residency will animate “Radici”, the final restitution with choreography by Maristella Martella. “Traditional dance reminds us of who we were,” explains Maristella Martella, “it is a danced mass that celebrates the social and identity glue of a community. We will work on – and from – tradition to tell what we have become. We will do this by distilling the best from the past, preserving popular authenticity and at the same time experimenting with new ways with the aim of making art.”
At the end of the performance, at 10 p.m., again at the former Convitto Palmieri, the protagonists are the stories of the Italians in the mines of Marcinelle with the theatrical show “Via. Epic of a migration” by Ura Teatro, conceived and designed by Stefano De Santis and Fabrizio Saccomanno, dramaturgy and direction by Fabrizio Saccomanno, with Fabrizio Saccomanno and Cristina Mileti.
“Via” tells the great and painful emigration of Italians who went to work in the coal mines in Belgium. It tells the story of post-war Italy, the agreements between the nascent Italian Republic and Belgium, the journey in trains locked up like animals, the hard work in the mines, the tragedy of Marcinelle. The work was written from his own family memories. The stories told by the grandparents and parents were found in the words of the widows and miners who returned to Italy, collected in a fieldwork of interviews that offer a sharp and inflexible reconstruction of that story.
The exhibition
From 19 July to 2 August Dancing the Earth also hosts the exhibition “On the run” by Gianluca Distante, which can be visited at the spaces of the former Convitto Palmieri. The “On the run” project tells the stories of Italian emigrants who arrived in Australia in the mid-twentieth century, and connects them to current migrations. Stories from the past, from a suffering Italy, where difficulties and needs moved overseas adventures, to explore and build new identities. Fleeing hunger and unemployment after a devastating war. This escape is in their eyes, and tells more than their memories of their being Italian. The works on display consist of collages of photos and newspaper articles, rags, paper cutouts, resin and coffee. A technique developed over the years, guided by the desire to create unique pieces, impossible to replicate, like the stories that the exhibition tells. Works that express the complex feeling of belonging and distance, and the open questions born from the encounter with an Italian who today inhabits the culture of his country of origin.
The educational and artistic residency
The residential workshop is held from 28 July to 1 August in the spaces of the former Convitto Palmieri.
The program includes thechoreographic aboratorium with Maristella Martella, the pizzica pizzica and folk dances workshop of southern Italy with Silvia De Ronzo, Antonio Congedo and Raffaella Vacca and several moments dedicated to the theme of roots, with thematic insights reserved for participants in the residency. Among these, “Roots: a reflection on migrations and identities to dance the Earth”, presentation of the Italea Puglia project with Sara Colonna, Giorgia Salicandro, Rita Piccinni; “Discovering the “Archives of the ‘900” by Giovanna Bino, inspector (IAO)-Archival Superintendence-Puglia-MiC, a journey into the “behind the scenes” of the Archives of the ‘900 kept at the former Convitto Palmieri dedicated to two Salento natives who became protagonists of twentieth-century art, Eugenio Barba – founder of the Odin Teatret – and Carmelo Bene; “InCOROnata”, a “choral workshop” curated by Ninfa Giannuzzi, a workshop for the preparation of the “sung walk”.
An “off” appointment is on August 2 at the Patronal Feast of San Biagio in Corsano (Lecce), with the replica of the final restitution, followed by a concert by Officina Zoè and dance by the Tarantarte Company.
DANCING THE EARTH 2025
All events are free admission!
Info and costs residential workshop info@tarantarte.it +39 335 6740238; +39 3478431794
INFO
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