Fragile
A dance performance which you can learn about beforehand from its participants—and try out the movements yourself, so that you can view them later through other eyes.
This year, the key theme of the
Fragile is a performance created by the Novosibirsk choreographer Andrei Korolenko. One might call it a choreography of relations: it focuses on how connections are established between four dancers in movement, and how their unified body comes into being. The viewers, with their vision, expectations, and emotions, also become part of this living structure.
I found it interesting to observe how—and whether—new connections could be truly formed between people, and the role of the person and the body in this process. Fragile is about testing the durability of relations, and about the body, which is subjected to pressure and constantly in a state of tension, and about the actual space of presence—not isolated and vulnerable, but open to emotional experience and empathy.
The method of presenting the performance is also fragile: instead of the traditional stage, the performance is moved to the open space of the House of Culture. The surrounding people, events, visual impressions and sounds—all of these things are distractions, but at the same time they add to the experience of perception, giving it greater depth. Can trust and openness arise in an open public space? Is it possible to concentrate and see a single whole in a situation when we are surrounded by the sounds of many voices? What is required for this? These are the questions that the choreographers ask the audience, and they will have to be answered together.
An important feature of this performance is that 30 minutes before it begins, the dancers appear at Prospekt and share practices of movement and attention used in Fragile. The audience can learn how these practices are connected with the project, and also try them out in small groups. With this new knowledge and experience, they can then watch the dance performance from a new perspective.
Curator
Anastasia Proshutinskaya
Mediators
Vasya Elenkin, Karina Chernyshova, Katerina Lyainen, Maria Zakurazhnova
Project team
Choreographer
Andrei Korolenko
Performers
Anastasia Kaigorodtseva, Andrei Korolenko, Alexandra Rudik, Ivan Sachkov
Costume designer
Tatyana Ludanik
Authors
Anastasia Kaigorodtseva
Dancer, performer, educator of contemporary dance. Junior scientific associate of the Lavrentiev Hydrodynamics Institute, Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Coauthor and lead dancer of the projects of the Synaesthetica Theatre (2017–2022). Participant of the “Context. Diana Vishneva, ” Access Point, THEATRUM, and Chaos festivals.
Andrei Korolenko
Choreographer, director, and performer. Producer and participant of Artmigration, the Beijing Dance Festival, Golden Mask, and Access Point festivals. Programme curator for the Chaos international festival of relevant theatre. Regularly collaborates with the youth drama theatre First Theatre and the “Context. Diana Vishneva” festival.
Alexandra RudikDirector and choreographer, educator, dancer, master of choreographic art. Founder of the bereg contemporary dance platform, ex-artist of the Ballet Moscow theatre. Invited choreographer of the Inclusion Centre for Creative Projects, artistic director of the Children Dance festival, educator for special dance at the Russian Institute of Theatre Arts.
Ivan SachkovDancer and choreographer. Lecturer at the St. Petersburg State Conservatory, the Boris Eifman Dance Academy and the Contrast Academy of Dance Art. Graduate of the Vaganova Academy of Russian Ballet. Has performed in productions by TeatrPlastichesky and Olga Labovkina’s Vozdukh project, and in Kirill Serebrennikov’s production of The Black Monk.
Performance created with the assistance of the “Context. Diana Vishneva” international festival of contemporary choreography.