Antena

Love stories begin in the morning, in a cool room, where these two
try to look each other in the eyes blinded by morning light
firmly in the eyes,
not looking away,
not ashamed of what has just been said,
not regretting what has just been done. And when someone is the first to stop – and who is the first to stop? He stops and looks over her shoulder, and notices the passers-by in the rain outside the window –
then in his gaze appears what
can be called love.

SERHIJ ZHADAN, translated by Bohdan Zadura

The director about the performance:
Translating Zhadan’s poetry into the language of dance, physical theatre and music, we adapt selected poems from the collection “Antena” which was published in 2018 for the stage. Our performance speaks in an elegiac tone about the ending of a love story, mourning the loss of a loved one, the fragility of human life, and resistance and creative power that allows us to overcome trauma.

Serhiy Zhadan is one of the most outstanding contemporary Ukrainian writers and poets. His life is connected with Kharkiv, he is considered a successor of the Ukrainian avant-garde. In 2022, the Committee on Literary Sciences of the Polish Academy of Sciences nominated the writer for the Nobel Prize in Literature. He has not left Kharkiv since 24.02.2022. In his chronicle published on social media, he became a witness to the war and a symbol of Ukrainian resistance.