A performance in between Bharata Natyam and Flamenco
“Sacred Love, Profane Love” begins with a series of dances from the South Indian clas- sical repertoire of Bharata Natyam. The highly mystical sophisticated artistic experience is based on metaphors of erotic relationships widely found in spiritual literature, starting from the Bible’s “Song of Songs”.
The second part of the performance presents Flamenco. Beyond the apparent distance, the aggressive eroticism of the flamenco bailaoras holding the edge of their skirts between their fingers, through a romantic secular transmutation, creates a link to the sacred world of the devadasi, the priestesses of Indian temples. This link is evoked through the specific zapateado technique (the heel-toe step) based on the Indian classical dance-theatre lexicon brought by the Roma people. The shape analogy also connects the flavours of a world now gone: the devotion of a prayer that becomes dance, the sense of honour and dedication that are delivered and embodied in the rhythm of Roma-Andalusian guitars.
