(IN)TANGIBLE HERITAGE(S)

Abstract

Flamenco has its own and characteristic artistic expressions such as duende flamenco, an expression that is difficult to perceive, since duende is something to be felt, which touches the emotional. Poet Federico García Lorca states that duende is a power and not an action, it is a struggle and not a thought: “it is not a matter of faculty, but of a true style of life; that is, of very ancient culture, of creation in action”. We can look at flamenco, an Andalusian cultural manifestation with gypsy roots, through duende and its intangibility. Vilém Flusser, on the other hand, states that there is no separation between material and intangible, which leads us to the connections that heritage studies establish between intangible and physical heritage. Our hypothesis seeks to understand manifestations of the intangible and its links with historical territories, using as an object of study resonances of flamenco in the neighborhood of Triana, in Sevilla, southern Spain, considering that the material versus immaterial dichotomy reaches high complexity and goes beyond traditional layers of information. Sevilla has flamenco as one of its main tourist attractions and in Triana, consequently, one of the supposed most of its original destinations, thus being placed as a global commodity. In our assumptions, this neighborhood is a place for the sale of “pure flamenco” shows in privatized spaces that use a distant echo of what this heritage really means. However, duende is missing there, and this void is also visible in the thematization of these spaces, which makes this kind of tourism an estrangement for the locals in their own city. As this is a tourist city that offers unique intangible values, as well as historical sites in constant preservation, the question that arises is: Is it really possible to separate material and intangible?