Home as a space of identity, home as a body and body as a home. International multi-genre project by performer Ewa Żurakowska based on the book House of Day, House of Night by Olga Tokarczuk.
Home as a space of identity, home as a body and body as a home.
Multidisciplinary project Home Beyond the Borders? is based on the themes from the novel House of Day, House of Night by Nobel Laureate Olga Tokarczuk. The monodrama takes us into the realm of sounds, poetic images and oneiric texts, video screenings and movement. Into the world of dreams, surreal and visionary reality inspired by dreams and visions of the Polish author. The performance also draws on local legends and tales from the Kłodzko and Nowa Ruda regions present in the novel.
Identity, putting down the roots, uprooting and returning
Home Beyond the Borders? explores the theme of home as a space of identity, home as a body and body as a home. It raises questions about transgressing boundaries between people and worlds, dream and reality, community and intimacy. It also constitutes the process of putting down roots in the landscape of the borderland in the Polish-Czech mountains, where the Nobel Prize winner’s book was written and where the performance is presented. A strong emphasis is placed on the issues of identity, putting down roots, uprooting and returning, especially since the action (both of the book and the performance) takes place in the ‘regained territories’, an area with Polish, Czech and German roots.
“I run and crash against the veil of Time. It is Time that separates me from the present, from being here and now. I speed up to skip over it. Behind the veil there is this forgotten primordial existence in which I really lived, in unity, with no expectations, and there I can move around at will, there I set myself free, there, behind the veil of light, I can turn into a plant, a deer or a mushroom, I am wild and at the same time I am in harmony with the world, with animals and trees, my sharp teeth and claws cause no harm, they are part of life.”
Ewa Żurakowska appeared in a wider nomination for the Thalia Awards 2022 for her role in this production.
At the organizer’s request, the performance can be supplemented by a concert of Songs of Our Roots.
Polish Premiere: July 31st, 2021, Gorzanow Castle
Czech premiere: November 21st, Venuše ve Švehlovce
Script, concept, performing: Ewa Żurakowska
Directed by: Maciej Gorczyński
Choreography: Cécile Da Costa
Dramaturgy co-operation: Hana Müllerová
Scenography, video: Iwona Bandzarewicz
Music: Vartui Saribekian, Oleksandr Dudko, Ewa Żurakowska
Producers: ProFitArt, z. s., Przestrzeń Wyobraźni
Co-producer: Fundacja Pałac Gorzanów
Partners: Venuše ve Švehlovce, Stowarzyszenie Kudowa, Underground klub Eden Broumov, Tibo Sound, Studio Alta, KD Mlejn
Supported by: International Visegrad Fund,State Fund of Culture of the Czech Republic, City of Prague, Ministry of Culture Czech Republic
Accompanying programme
SONGS OF OUR ROOTS
A collage of poems about the elements of nature, the connection between man and nature, the search for the path between sun and moon, night and day, life and death. Original texts and songs from the countries where the artists of Home Beyond the Borders? come from – performer and singer Ewa Żurakowska, saxophonist Oleksandr Dudko and violinist Vartui Saribekian.
Reviews
“The international multi-genre project of the author and performer Ewa Zurakowská based on the book House of Day, House of Night by the Nobel Prize winner Olga Tokarczuk is an example of a unique, truly searching approach to the subject, the composition and the means used. Ewa Zurakowska offers her equipment and more than one hundred percent multifaceted performance commitment in an unusual, layered, absorbing and harrowingly personal confession of man not only to nature.”
(Roman Černík, Divadelní noviny, 11. ledna 2022)
“Zurakowská alternated between fast dance movements that helped to gradate the plot with calm to motionless steps, which in turn called for stoic calmness in the emotions of the audience. With the movements, she also composed singing, which in the gradation of the plot was more like a scream. At such a moment, a person experiences a strong emotional strain, which it forces him to experience the story as if it were his own. (…) The whole performance seemed very simple, both with a single performer and with the number of props. Nevertheless, it was a demanding composition of a perfectly elaborate plot, which was told through words, singing, dancing, interacting with viewers, with video projections that complemented it, but also with lighting that changed depending on the climax of the plot. I’m not surprised that Ewa Zurakowská appeared at the Thalia Awards. She perfectly managed to portray what Tokarczuk was trying to do and they were enough for her to plus two canvases and an animal skull.”
(Vendula Kryštofová, 6. 12. 2022, kulturio.cz)
