Anthropos

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  Riddum

  Anthropos, All

  The sacred word of Sancha Prasad Rai, shaman of the Himalayas.

  “One day, the aged shaman Sancha Prasad Rai told me the story of his people. The sacred tale that even today the elders of the Kulung Rai tribe hand down orally from generation to generation, under the name of “riddum”.
  This story starts a long, long time ago. It begins before all the objects that surround us were manifest in their infinite variety, and even before human beings appeared on the face of the Earth”.

   

  Martino Nicoletti, Riddum, Le loup des steppes, 2015

   

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• 

  Shamanic Solitudes

  Anthropos, All

  Ecstasy, Madness and Spirit Possession in the Nepal Himalayas.

   

  An itinerary – only apparently circular – furrows the universe of Kulunge Rai shamanism in Nepal. A nomadic religion, generated within the space of a double geography that weaves vivid visionary foreshortenings into the flat weft of reality.

  An extraordinary journey through the principal places composing the universe of shamanic reality: the “call” by the spirits of the wood. The dreams and initiatic visions; the vocational sickness and flight into the forest – mandatory steps on the path to obtaining powers; the praxis of healing and funerary rituals, centered on the experience of a “magic journey” accomplished by crossing different regions of the cosmos; the body’s function and corporeity within the choreutic-musical world of shamanism: a body acting as temple and simulacrum for a divine epiphany. As a frontier between worlds. A vocal and sonorous body capable of starting up the great shamanic machine.

   

  Martino Nicoletti, Shamanic Solitudes, Le loup des steppes, 2015

   

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• 

  The Ancestral Forest

  Anthropos, All

  Memory, Space and Ritual among the Kulunge Rāi of Eastern Nepal

  Settled among the high hills of eastern Nepal, which has meant centuries of cultural isolation, the Kulunge Rāi ethnic group have tenaciously maintained their religious tradition ever since their ancient origins.

  Bearing witness to a far-off past of hunting and nomadic life, their myths and legends form a plot and scenario that comprise a multitude of invisible entities: the “hunter-spirits” and the “monkey spirits”, the undisputed sovereigns of the forest world; Laladum, the deity who resembles a little girl, the initiator of young shamans from the villages of the area; the Nagi, or ophidiomorphic-spirits, dwelling in the waters, the totem ancestors of the Kulunge Rāi group; Molu, a mythical forefather, lost in the woods and transformed into a deity.

   

  Martino Nicoletti, The Ancestral Forest, Le loup des steppes, 2015

   

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• 

  The Ecstatic Body

  Anthropos, All

  Notes on Shamanism and Corporeity in Nepal.

  “…The shaman who entertains the gods by dancing and music, is the same man who entertains the audience through the more performative aspects of the séance. Here, it is ordinary people who exploit the situation, coming to attend a performance that, in primis, has been organised for the gods.
  A singular performance, to which, besides the chance of direct witness of the epiphany of gods, spirits and demons, is added the no less stimulating possibility of witnessing human destinies suspended over an uncertain fate…”

   

  Martino Nicoletti, The Ecstatic Body, Le loup des steppes, 2015

   

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• 

  The Nomadic Sacrifice

  Anthropos, All

  The Chöd Pilgrimage among the Bönpo of Dolpo (Western Nepal)

  In the heart of the Himalayas, some officiants belonging to Tibet’s ancient religion, Bön, undertake a long ritual pilgrimage through wild and inhospitable terrain inhabited by mountain gods, genii, demons and the restless souls of the dead.

  Using instruments fashioned from human bone, the officiants evoke the presence of invisible beings in order to celebrate the symbolic sacrifice of their own body (chöd) which is offered as to the spirits as food during a singular ritual banquette.

   

  Martino Nicoletti, The Nomadic Sacrifice, Le loup des steppes, 2015

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• 

  The Zoo of the Giraffe Women

  Anthropos, All

  A Journey among the Kayan of Northern Thailand.

  In a village in the far north of Thailand, under the stunning light of a tropical sun, surreal women impeccably wearing their ethnic attire, smiling and motionless, offer themselves to the cameras of voracious tourists.

  Adorned with gorgeous necklaces of shining brass coils, they are the famous “giraffe women”, the epithet commonly used to define members of the Kayan tribe originally from eastern Burma.
  The vivid contrast between the myths narrating the origin of this ethnic group and their current condition as refugees from the civil war in their homeland provides an outstanding and sharp testimony to life in Thailand’s “human zoos”.

  A wide selection of photographs taken by the author using old vintage cameras from the early 1900s and the link to a poignant short video, shot with Super-8 film, enrich the volume, visually amplifying the unique mood of the written account.

   

  Martino Nicoletti, The Zoo of the Giraffe Women, Le loup des steppes, 2015

   

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