Tandava's Bio

Carol Tandava Henning has performed internationally an actor, director, writer, producer, bellydancer, theatrical improviser, and comedienne. As a longtime student of Jungian thought, she actively applies archetypal principles to her work -- in particular her solo show Blood on the Veil, which explores the healing and transformative powers of dance.

A Brooklyn native and born performer, Carol stepped into her first pair of ballet and tap shoes at age five and continued to study dancing, singing, acting, and short-form improvisation through her late teens.

In 2000, she suffered a traumatic abdominal injury and surgery, which was further exacerbated by the herniation of three discs in her lower back, leaving her with limited mobility and severe internal and external scarring. She tried various remedies from physical therapy to surgery to yoga to pilates to tai chi, but her condition did not improve much.

In 2004 she began to study SharQui, a fitness-based bellydance method created by award-winning dancer and fitness professional Oreet, and began to feel improvement almost immediately. Bellydance did more than help her build muscular strength and flexibility; the deep core movements began to dissolve the scar tissue as well as bring awareness to her body.
She fell in love with bellydance, Middle Eastern music, and the beautiful community of dancers and musicians devoted to this art.

In addition to her work in SharQui, Carol furthered honed her dance technique in a wide variety of Egyptian, Turkish, Lebanese, and American cabaret styles with New York dance legends including Ranya, Shoshanna, Rayhana, Dalia Carella, Aszmara, Nourhan Sharif, Jehan, Mariyah, Mark Balahadia, Tarik Sultan, Morocco, Tamar-Kali, Altgracia, Elena Lentini, Yousry Sharif, Mohamed Shahin, and Anahid Sofian, as well as visiting instructors Diana Tarkhan, Leila Molaei, Tamalyn Dallal, Bozenka, Jillina, Sonia, Louchia, Jim Boz, Ansuya, Alexandra King, Shareen el Safy, Linda Faoro, Mohamed El Hosseny, Randa Kamel, Ahmed Hussein, Raqia Hassan, Zahra Zuhair and Faten Salama.

Carol also actively practices a variety of spiritual movement techniques, including Dunya's Dancemeditation, and Gabrielle Roths's 5Rhythms, along with Sufi whirling and veil meditation with Adnan Sarhan and Nahari.

She adopted the dancer name Tandava -- the Sansrkit word for the god Shiva's dance, which is the source of the cycle of creation, preservation and dissolution -- as her work in bellydance brought about a profound rebirth in her creative energy.

Click for Tandava's Full Bio