Paper short abstract:

In our film "Tarantism Revisited" (forth. 2021) we make use of the potentiality of the essayistic form as an empirical artistic ethnographic research practice that multimodally explores the fascination of an ›exotic‹ spider-possession cult in Southern Italy.

Paper long abstract:

The essay film has been an established genre since the 1940s but its approaches have not been taken aboard in ethnographic filmmaking (except in recent films by Mattijs van de Port; see also van de Port 2018). This is puzzling considering the explicit intention of the essay film to critically assess the relationship between textual and audio-visual forms of knowing. In our feature-length film "Tarantism Revisited" (forth. 2021) we make use of the potentiality of the essayistic form as an empirical artistic ethnographic research practice that multimodally explores the fascination that an ›exotic‹ Italian spider-possession cult has had on scientists, artists, filmmakers and tourists for centuries.

The film approaches the phenomenon of Apulian tarantism from the perspective of Anna, an illiterate farm worker. In touching letters written between 1959 and 1965 to anthropologist Annabella Rossi, Anna describes her personal experiences of illness, suffering and healing through tarantism. These letters are a unique historic document and constitute the dramaturgical backbone of our film. Anna's descriptions are juxtaposed with archival audio-visual materials from post-war Italy (films, TV shows, photographs, music) as well as footage from our own ethnographic research (i.e. through tableaux vivants, photographic series, drawings and experimental ambient sound montages).

As filmmakers and ethnographers we revisit - hence the title - the sites, landscapes and archival materials related to the phenomenon of Apulian tarantism and analyse the survival and utilization of these iconic images through audio-visual montage and an open narrative form that is constitutive of the essay film.