The only sighting of Arachnea parapluviosis louisiensis, in Dutch commonly known as Wieske’s umbrella spider, occurred in Mariakerke Ostend, near the church of Ter Duinen around Ensor’s grave.
Concerning the umbrella spider human narrow-mindedness, fear, and aversion to the unknown has nowhere been more evident than in the case of Wieske’s umbrella spider.
This species was destined for a tragic fate. They were born from Maman, Louise Bourgeois’ famous sculpture that towered over Ensor’s grave in 2006. The joy of their birth was short-lived. The newborns were soon hunted down, rounded up, slaughtered, and tossed -without fame or respect- over a hedge by anonymous specimens of Homo sapiens. They remained behind the hedge until they were loaded onto trucks and likely taken to an unknown mass grave at an unidentified landfill. This act of mass destruction was clearly driven by a mixture of artistic-cultural narrow-mindedness, speciesism and xenophobic squeamishness.
