The hope for coming home and the ordeal of this hope

We are inviting you to crowdfund this project which is about our today, its sore spots and great opportunities. We are creating a performance in which the voices of the actors will sound alongside with the live stories of those who is looking for their home and finding one. Due to Russian aggression in Eastern Ukraine, almost 2 million of people have been forced to leave their households and to look for a new home in other parts of the country. We want to hear real stories of often faceless internal migrants, to learn about their experiences and ways of coming home, about time and distances.

The Sand is the hope for coming home and the ordeal of this hope.

The performance weaves together two powerful traditions of self-expressing – those of Eastern Europe and Africa as people there are learning to hear, understand and make sense from very similar dramatic situations with migrants. The performance is combination of dancing and singing in response is topoems dialogs between Ukrainian, South African and other authors from Africa.

We invite you to join our story, to support the performance “The Sand” at Spilnokosht crowdfunding platform.

Two years ago, in 2016 thanks to your help on Big Idea platform you have supported us for publication of an anthology of contemporary Ukrainian and African poets "I Will Be Waiting for you under Kaise-Drat ". In 2017 the choreographers of Contemporary Dance Platform with Dyvyna ethnotheatre and AfriKAN drummers were inspired by the anthology to create an unparalleled performance – the Sand. In the language of poetry and dance, traditional music of Eastern Ukraine and Western Africa, the story of roads, losses and search of home – sometimes hopeless was told .

This performance changed those spectators who saw it, but even more the actors themselves. The theme of road and home turned out to be very appealing and painful for each of us, as some of us have lost their home and the others are sharing theirs.

The opening night of the new performance – enriched by the experiences of resettled people is planned for April 2018 in Kyiv. HOW WE WORK

Our team consists of dancers, singers, musicians. We combine several traditions and techniques: contemporary poetry and dance - with the songs of Eastern Ukraine and rhythms of West Africa. Now, our interdisciplinary performance becomes more interactive, embracing stories and voices from life, not from books.

We plan to record interviews with internally displaced persons in Zaporizhzhya, Lutsk and Mariupol, in three Ukrainian cities where the processes of their integration into communities occur in quite different ways. They will talk about their thoughts of returning home. And about their experience that can become either useful store or a burden.

We take a risk by touching the sore spots of today’s society. But we do believe in the magic power of art. We believe that poetry, dancing, singing and feeling rhythms are those magic healing forces that would decrease our pain and make it disappear.

We plan our performance to become a mobile platform for shows and further discussions; we want it to travel to the cities of Ukraine. Residents of Mariupol, Lutsk and Zaporizhzhya it will enjoy free entrance.

The funds collected will cover the organization of interviews with internally displaced persons from Mariupol, Lutsk and Zaporizhzhya, which will become part of the performance. They will also allow us to stage it, to pay for the rehearsal premises, light and sound support.

To support please use the red button Donate / Фондувати. The amount charged is in UAH.