Joachim Koester: Tarantism
Denmark and New York-based artist Joachim Koester (AIR ’13) presents Tarantism, a film installation in which performers enact the “dancing cure”—an Italian folk method of curing a tarantula bite. Emerging during the Middle Ages, the phenomenon of convulsive, knee-shaking, teeth-grinding dancing was widespread in Italy until the mid 20th century. Koester’s work uses the reenactment of the ritual to explore the unconscious and unexplored abilities of the body. Experience a rare viewing of the installation and conversation with the artist; preceded by an Italian-inspired dinner in the Mess Hall.
*Co-presented with Kadist Art Foundation, kadist.org
Attention: Due to ongoing roadwork, please expect delays of up to 15 minutes in the Marin Headlands. Directions to Headlands here.
Exhibition at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts
Joachim Koester: HOWE | Nov 15, 2013–Feb 16, 2014
For those interested in viewing more of Koester’s work, mark your calendars for this upcoming exhibition at YBCA. For his exhibition at YBCA, Koester will show his 16mm film Of Spirits and Empty Spaces (2012) about the American spiritualist and activist John Murray Spear who, along with his congregates at the settlement The Domain in rural Upstate New York in 1861, sought the designs for a new sewing machine through trance and movement. At the time, Elias Howe had already developed a sewing machine with several strong patents, which Spear and his group intended to circumnavigate in order to create a new and cheaper machine that would be accessible to ordinary people. Alongside this work, Koester will debut a new film commissioned by YBCA and the Kadist Art Foundation featuring Elias Howe’s sewing machine. Learn more