On June 3rd, two events, one in Finland and another in Madrid, awakened the powerful spirit of the Duende, enunciated by poet Federico Federico García Lorca as a state of ‘tragedy-inspired ecstasy, a poetic emotion which is uncontrolled’.
El Duende, an earth spirit from Andalusian folklore, is usually associated with flamenco culture, but thanks to these performances, we feel it acquired its universal artistic reach connecting cultures and people beyond any geographical limitation. Screaming Duende marks a milestone in the AaltoSiilo as a multimedia performance and exhibition space.
Screaming Duende was also live-streamed at the Instituto Iberoamericano de Finlandia in Madrid, where Sudanese musician Wafir Gibril sang flamenco songs in Arabic accompanied by his lute. Highlighting the rich Arab influences of flamenco, Gibril’s performance acted as a cultural bridge to Oulu and its growing community of Syrian and Iraqi refugees. Wearing a Syrian sash across his breast, the characteristic quejío or grief-stricken lamentations associated with flamenco evoked the hardship and suffering of refugees.