Practice of falling

Falls bring pain, but it also bring healing.
Three artists: Ukraine, Belarus, Russia, whose nations were plunged into a criminal, bloody war, convey their hard feelings through movements and cinematic language.


We created the work “Falling Practices” by the three of us:
Anton — performer, dance artist, Belarus
Katerina Taran – actress, Ukrainian
Dina Veryutina – director from Russia.

I saw Katya in the evening at an anti-war rally, in the first days of the war. It seemed that in her huge eyes there was fear and pain, and despair, and horror of all those who gathered in the same place at the same hour. We hugged, and stood like that for a long time, she had a red coat.

color no longer matters
trembling all over
concrete field
smile
cold and direct
everted joints
open space
twisted
the coat is heavy, very felt.

a few days later, Anton showed his performance of the “practice of falling”. He fell, got up and fell again, he crashed on the floor and again found the strength to get up, his arms and shoulders became red from the blows, but he did not feel them, he fell and got up, fell and got up. I had tears, I wanted to go on stage, hug and stop him.
In 2020, Anton took an active part in the protests in Minsk, now he is wanted, he cannot legally come to Belarus, he can be taken into the army and sent to war.

swinging in the wind
asphalt – keeps its shape
when it’s hard to breathe – loose clothing
the easier
there is something sticky on the feet
there is no end and end
earth – linen
it’s about hope

I suggested Anton and Katya make a film together, I didn’t know which one.
Throughout March and early April, we met for several hours and talked a lot about what we feel, about what we live, about how we cope with it. I asked Katya to speak in Ukrainian about her childhood, which she spent in Sumy, about her grandmother, about what land is in Ukraine.
Anton spoke in Belarusian about the struggle of the 20th year, about unity, about fear, about love! I listened and memorized sounds, words, intonations.
Anton offered bodily practices and sometimes we moved all together, sometimes they moved together, and I watched and wrote down. I offered to repeat something, to clarify something. The film came together like a puzzle, where we took a fragment from each practice and combined it, but we decided to keep the main line of the “fall”. In parallel with bodily solutions, visual solutions also came, our main images were: dirt, fear, struggle, helplessness, tenderness, care, violence.

shaking head
dark is less visible
in the hands of the castle
save yourself

The main musical line was the Ukrainian folk song that Katya performs at the beginning of the film. We immediately decided that we would use singing, but the choice of the song was up to Katerina. She chose this song because the words and mood corresponded to our state as much as possible: we all did not know what to do and where we are when the oak forest is burning next to us. “Dubrava” in Ukrainian is not only an oak forest, but also a village. The next morning, after a night of filming, we arrived at a small recording studio to record another version of the song, already in the studio. I asked Katerina to bring a “bandura” with her – this is a stringed Ukrainian folk musical instrument, for almost forty minutes Katerina played a musical improvisation on the theme of everything she felt during the filming: cold, fear, homelessness, night. This is how the music for our film was born.