No, not quite so. Robert Wyatt saw MEPHISTO WALTZ in Edinburgh, with his wife Alfie («I knew, I knew there will be Sunflowers!»).
I don’t know how my life would be different if there was no Rock Bottom album.
Would I go to Tartu then, visiting that hippie convention? Would I hitch-hike across half of Russia? Would I write short stories, would I fall in love, would I leave Leningrad for Prague?
Would I meet Sasha Davydov (our first «joint» and the world burst open).
Probably not…
Recently at the Film Festival in Venice I passed by a huge building as they took me through the canals. Something jolted inside of me. I remembered: Robert Wyatt. It must be the place where he started to work on that album.
Then I bought the LP again. The salesman in the record shop also commented on this: „Best Ever!“
A long time has passed but THIS hasn’t changed. From the very first sound I lost the sense of human ambitions. Just as easily as it happened 30 years ago, right then I left everythingbehind and flew along the Path of the Heart….
But now in Edinburgh I was ashamed to speak out and tell that I myself and my Mephisto are like that because of Rock Bottom. My English was rather insufficient to describe the main point. Neither should I try and reproduce his words now. They will remain on that small street, caught in the soot from the Zippo lighter.
He said: «I used to believe that I only could be moved to parallel worlds by my own force. I wouldn’t trust the mission to somebody else. But it happened now. If they ask „what IS Mephisto Waltz“? Is it a life-form? Well, yes… Is it a forgettable form? No. Who’s there to forget? I’m not an accuser here… Unreal life-form. Yes, right… an unreal form of life.»
Text: Anton Adasinsky
English text editor: Daniel Williams
The Scarecrow stood on the edge of the field. Replacement for his rusty tin-cans was well overdue.
The Wind stole his hat and his coat was ragged.
But joy was always coming in December .
Village children used to make a Snowman right next to the Scarecrow. Right like Snowmen should be: with a tin bucket on his head and a carrot as his nose. The sleeve of the Scarecrow’s coat was then tied to the Snowman’s twig paw and with a happy squeals children were aiming their snowballs at the pair of figures. Maybe children wanted to separate them again.
The Scarecrow was smiling though. Yes, truly. He was smiling.
And then April came on tiptoes and took the Snowman away. Just a twig remained tied to the Scarecrow’s sleeve.
But it’s alright. December will come again. Not quite soon but it will. I can wait.
I can wait.
Hello everybody!
In just one week DEREVO starts the new series of shows, where?
Yes, of course in Edinburgh. For the eighth time.
Probably there’s no need anymore. We’ve got all the main prizes. Everyone knows us here, except maybe the first wife of the Mayor, ‘cos she lives on Malta.
But the year without the Fringe seems to be incomplete. The Fringe is a running track in time. Backwards. Back to the honest days.
The show’s temper can be hardened by this. Harden, let down, bend and forge again, cling-clang… in our aprons, merrily…
Yes, there’s a risk that the „horseshoe“ of the show breaks. It may happen. That’s why it’s the Fringe.
MEPHISTO WALTZ becomes a joyous performance. I still couldn’t write a proper description text for it. I tried. I know I can do it. But it just doesn’t need any texts.
Excuse me for an extremely plain depiction of the complicated theory of Agoraphobia. The subject is definitely worth a deeper contemplation. Maybe I’ll come back to it soon at some of our workshops.
From a very young age a human requires some physical limit of the world.
Something that reminds us of the prenatal closeness. Such space can be a cave, a tree hollow, a city appartment, a sleeping bag… even a canvas tent would be placed next to a tree if possible, not because of the rain or wind. It just seems to give some kind of protection.
Skipping all eight volumes of a detailed commentary on the subject I’d rather leap right to the conclusion: everyone is affected by Agoraphobia, at least with its minimal symptoms. And this is what DEREVO is quite interested for.
In case of the Terschelling island, measuring 20 by 4 km, there’s an opportunity to try out something what hardly fits the indoor training.
For instance that can be practices connected with an extended influence range of dancers on their audience, as well as some techniques of „wide-shot-like focusing of eyes“ or dynamically adjusting the dance according to the distance to a partner or an instant transition to the dance action in front of the audience and many more.
It is stated in DEREVO’s Manifest „the sky begins right from the ground“, well it’s easier said…
Once on a summer day at the Elbe, as merry and damp as I was, I shouted to Slava Guyvoronsky „Why don’t you bath?“. „I wasn’t invited“ he replied.
One and a half months of work: St Petersburg, Moscow, Potsdam, Dresden, Leipzig.
I heartily congratulate our students Nastya Ponomareva, Pavel Alekhin (aka Gleb Sinichkin), Makhina Dzhuraeva. This is the first show entirely created by themselves.
And Alexey Lanskoy evolved no less than into DEREVO’s technical manager.
And Nastya could also be seen in HARLEKIN in the main part of Pieretta and The Devoted Monkey at the Golden Mask Festival. Really not bad for just two years working with DEREVO…
About Oleg Zhukovsky you could read in the previous news. And if you could see Lena just now…..
Well, and now to the performances coming up.
In Poland – Nastya Ponomareva with her solo project Lunis.
Our dearest OEROL Festival on Terschelling island comes next. DEREVO School On Wheels will be improvising throughout ten days on an entire island day and night.
And then the wonderful festival and funfair Schaubudensommer in Dresden, with its tents and barkers… just like it was centuries ago.
And Edinburgh Fringe with MEPHISTO WALTZ. Apparently we can’t live without that adrenaline rush. Anna Bogodist has prepared a large scale invasion of Scotland with the „Russians in Roxy“ Programme.
So, that’s it. I don’t think I’ve ever wrote such a dry and plotless piece of news. Maybe I should attach a passport photo to it and the vase at the window with the half of a tomcat.
Anton.
Text: Anton Adasinsky English text editor: Daniel Williams Photo: Natalya Krymskaya, Roman Ekimov, Alexey Kostromin
There’s an entire series of exercises within the DEREVO system which is dedicated to “anchors”: our habits, preferences, duties and desires…
All of those exercises I was joyfully trying out on a single test subject (and by his merciful agreement). Many of the exercises have been proved to be good ones. This man has become an even more happy and merry person than previously. Well, for the people around him he might have become useless but terribly interesting.
I could not say he shows up in my life very often but it’s always at the right time.
I was looking at the title «Ketzal. Part two». And I felt that a few other people in the world were looking anxiously for something at the very same moment.
A telephone rang. Not the mobile but the almost forgotten office landline. It was this same man, asking for a possibility to stay and sleep for a while in the studio.
He came with a backpack, rather merry again. He made a dug-out in the backyard and installed a small tent above it. An entire day he was busy with making a pickled cabbage, singing and sweeping the ground.
If I go left and he goes right we’ll turn around the globe and meet again.
About his dug-out he said, that it’s his desire to find out about the bears sucking their paws, about slowing down the body’s functions and overall about being below the level of human activity. He asked me to put over the lid and get some earth on it. He reminded me that God has gave himself the trouble to caulk up the seams of the Noah’s Ark from the outside.
Noah’s Ark…
You’re probably aware of the story. There’s one point in it…. as the decision was made, the Earth was to be purged of scum… But the Lord God really couldn’t arrange this slaughter with his leaving the first of all his men still alive… so he’s been waiting for Adam to die.
I covered the lair with earth and wondered about the smell of the Spring while it was just a humus. Everything fits.
It means «Ketzal. Part two. Noah’s Ark»
The man’s name is Oleg Zhukovsky. Once he saw the «Rider» in St. Petersburg he was jumping through puddles all night long and he followed us on our way next morning. With the same backpack.
It’s a good sign that he’s here again.
Text: Anton Adasinsky English text editor: Daniel Williams Photos: Oleg Zhukovsky
DEREVO, in its own way, continues to work on the film Doppio:
Anton thinks the screenplay is not ready.
The guitarist Igor Timofeev thinks that the videoclip “Zvezda” (The star) comprises all the ideas of the motion picture and thus the shooting is over…
Leonid Leikin thinks there’s a series to be filmed and in particular from the starting point of Episode 3. ..
Anyway, the work goes on.
In following we offer you the video “Zvezda”, one significant photo and the long text which explains its significance.
Please, don’t get me wrong. A new thing is a new thing. An old one is old.
A thing comes cold to the world. Then it meets its first human being, takes a part of their warmth, their soul. Then it happens again and again.
Coloured by people’s love, a thing starts glistening, the circle of its admirers expands.
Both a human and a thing may have quarrels, divorces, picnics, weddings and crimes. A thing can run away from home, have an affair. A thing can punish or even kill. Don’t get me wrong.
There are living things and there are dead things. Just like people. But dead man is usually buried while a dead thing persists in the world until it is physically decayed .
A living thing has always been a part of a man’s destiny. Whether it was a car or a salt cellar. In the beginning of 70’s people started to sing sad songs. Weariness and the Lack of Faith have been summoned by the sounds of those ballads:lack of Faith in many things, including one’s own work. Why must one produce a good thing? Who will see the difference?
China, cold-blooded and faceless, loaded us with so many dead things. Particularly mean is the fact that they were the copies of the real things, an in each and every one of them there was a little man with his hard moustache and sly eyes, laughing…
Musical instruments have endured the longest…
I’m constantly in search of old guitars, trying to keep or to extend their life. I know there will come a day when there will be not a single old guitar leftin the world. But until then…
Hofner Congress comes from the 50’s . Pretty low priced it gained not too much respect and could be taken everywhere: to a beach, to a picnic… So just very few of them survived.
The classified ad attracted me by its brevity and a kind of timidity: “An old guitar for sale”. Full stop. And just one photo with an old wrapping in front. It seemed to me that the owner didn’t want to approach any nearer to it. The price was plainly invented: 100 Euro. By its shape I guessed it would be a Hofner. I’ve got a confirmation on the phone later. He also said that the guitar was hanging on the wall for 40 years. We made an appointment.
At night in the hallway of his house somewhere in Bavaria I asked him if he knows that his guitars actually would cost much more.
“It’s possible”, he said, “but it doesn’t matter now”.
He didn’t put the hundred Euro into his pocket, just kept trying to get rid of the banknotes.
We had to co-operate to put the old wrapping on. The guitar didn’t want to fit in. I asked him if he plays at all. He answered rather loud, as if it was for someone else.
“No. My father wanted me to, so he gave it to me”, then he corrected himself, “well, he bought it for me”.
He really wanted me to leave. I wanted the same.
In the car I had to open the windows, so strong was the foul smell of the wrapping . No, this guitar was not hanging on the wall. It was closed up in a cellar when a small boy has not become a musician. But dreams are dying slowly, so neither father nor the son were capable of parting with this thing.
How it shined when I removed the mould and grime layer. It was actually NEW! Nobody has ever played on it ! Inside I noticed a piece of paper. I’ve pulled it out and sat for a long time not knowing what to do with it. On a crumpled piece of paper there was a child scribble: a boy behind bars (or strings) and an inscription “I mustn’t”.
Text: Anton Adasinsky
English text editor: Daniel Williams
… You’re asleep.
Curled, embracing the pillow, deep under the blanket.
It’s late at night.
And you’re asleep,
And nobody knows who you’re going to be the next ringing morning.
What kind of chain armour you’ll be wearing by then. Will you be a politician, a faithful wife or an old man or… ?
You’re asleep. And the other one is sleeping too, the one you’ll see in the sight of a gun or the one at the shop, holding an avocado…
The only one, who will become a reason to miss the train…
Tonight we are just children.
It doesn’t matter how rich you see yourself in your dreams, no matter how big the painting over the bed. And the thrilled servants behind the bedroom door, changing your coffee cup every ten minutes to keep it warm, they do not matter either.
Just one bed for all, and one Home and one World.
We’re asleep and, oh God, let us stay so just a while longer, not to slip into the shells of our lives quite yet.
I know I’ll wake up and I’ll become the one who I must be, who I have to be, who I got used to being.
But now… there’s no war, no treason, no labour.
We’re asleep.
Like children,
And…
And I want to be like you,
To love and to be loved.
May Those Who We Insult During The Day Forgive Us At Night!
They were sleeping during the night too and they were wishing me Well.
I’m asleep.
Happy New Year! …
Text: Anton Adasinsky English text editor: Daniel Williams Photo: Anton Adasinsky, Igor Fomin, Nastya Ponomareva, S. Neuhaus, T. Belousova Video: Nastya Ponomareva
One day before the award ceremony Johannes Zeiler (Faust) and I did thirty two interviews each. And Alexander Sokurov did even more.
Every interview started with the question “what do you feel now having the Golden Lion?” By the first one I gave a start “did we get it already then?”
“No”, said the journalist, “but if you will, then we’ll put it together, if not, then we’ll cut it out. We wouldn’t be able to do another interview, right?”.
So I had to sing a song about how happy we are, without knowing who’s gonna win the prize.
After fifth interview I couldn’t keep repeating the same text all the time. I began to falter, to become angry, to accuse the journalists of illiteracy and Venice of the heat. I was tired. During the lunch time I ran back to my room and took my recorder, feeling that I might not remember anything I’ll tell then.
Here are some excerpts of the afternoon conversations.
Korean television:
“What was the most difficult during your filming”
“The most difficult was to stare at the director’s back for 47 days. Sokurov not only used a huge mirror against the camera for the actual filming but to see the picture in the same way he was carrying a car mirror on his shoulder. Thus discussing the role I remained behind him and was talking to Sokurov’s shoulder. I got used to it so much that I didn’t recognized our director as we met in Venice.”
Belarus newspaper:
“Anton, could you tell us if there’s some material in the “Faust” that didn’t make it to the final cut?”
“Oh, yes! Right in the beginning of the film Faust actually dies. Don’t you wonder how keen director’s idea was. In the hospital a bed with a cadaver, which Faust was just examining and looking for a human soul, falls on him. Wagner, his disciple tries to free Faust and pulls some substance with little similarity to Faust, fat and messy. Though this is Faust melted together with the Death. This is my character, Mephistopheles. Faust keeps living inside me. Well, by the final cut the entire shot, about 15 minutes, has been left out. “It’s obvious”, Sokurov said, “why would we need to explain it?”. So Faust didn’t die but I remain there with a huge fat stomach.”
Japanese newspaper:
“Anton, could you tell us what was the most dangerous moment during filming?”
“The most dangerous thing was to walk backwards. Particularly on the Iceland’s lava. For the entire film was shot backwards, actors had to do everything in the reverse order. This is why the big part of material, the underwater fight for Margaret, has been left out. We were unable to swim backwards. And Sokurov didn’t want to make any compromises.”
I don’t remember who:
“The most unusual thing was that Valley in Iceland where we saw hundreds of faceprints on the ground around the geyser, just like somebody would press his face firmly against it. There were big holes in place of mouths. Well, it turned out to be the Famous Sniffing Valley. Each Sunday hundreds of people lie down with their faces on the ground and inhale the healing sulphur moisture. Our film crew tried it too but without habit to do it our director of photography has started to hallucinate and suggested to dye the Geyser red. “Go to Tarantino with this”, said Sokurov.”
RAI uno, Italy:
“The Frisean horses that we ride on the way to Underworld are rare and expensive. They also known for their ability to pronounce words with lots of G’s and R’s. One of them (mine) could distinctly say “Great Rumble” and “Rare Gift”, thanks to the Czech groom, a big fan of Pushkin.”
Greek TV:
“Anton, could you tell us what funny moments from filming you still remember?”
“There was many funny things. In a break I went to the adjacent woods for a walk and rest. I came across a clearance full of wild mushrooms. Pure porcini! I had no basket or anything and started to fill my pockets, thanks to the oversized costume. Full of mushrooms I realised that I went astray. And I was scared by the thought that I may derange the filming. I started to shout in russian and italian for help. Czech family of mushroom-pickers has come around and ran off immediately – I totally forgot about my make-up. In fifteen minutes there were three policemen. I tried to explain in Czech about the filming and made a confident gesture to some fictional direction. There we went. After twenty minutes we turned on my command and lost our way entirely. One of them pulled his pistol, another one called for a helicopter. It came much later and there was no place for landing. In the twilight it showed us a way. When finally we came to the filming location, full of burdock, angry, the policemen couldn’t really accuse me of anything. Sokurov in turn couldn’t find a better question to ask me: “where did you find them?”
“In the forest”, I replied thinking of the mushrooms, “there’s lots of them.”
And on September the 10th we perfectly played the piece “Limousine, Red Carpet, Golden Lion, Photo, Limousine, Much Wishky, Night. Venice. Morning. Way Back Home”.
The excitement of these days has gone quite fast. What remains is “Faust” and an untypically long (for a festival) standing ovation for the director Alexander Sokurov.
Text: Anton Adasinsky
English text editor: Daniel Williams
Video: Elena Yarovaya
«let the good man in, otherwise he’ll break down the door» («Aibolit-66», USSR, 1966)
Dear friends,
A very intense one and a half years have ended with a performance in Jyväskylä.
Both Anton and Lena are leaving for creative holidays to the Island of Monkeys and Butterflies to write the screenplay for a feature film. An offer from the Lenfilm studios has come rather surprisingly. Pre-production is going to start in October. And we had better keep the plot a secret now.
In September, as an exercise, DEREVO is going to film some videos to the music by Positive Band. We suspect it might become a film too. That’d be good.
Cast:
Such a one – Anton Adasinsky
Chief Wow-Wow – Igor Timofeev
Ferdinand – Nikolay Gusev
DJ Cornflower – Andrey Sizintsev
Emmanuel Brüskind – Alexey Rakhov
Friendly Geometer – Viktor Vyrvich
Frigate «The Swift» – Elena Yarovaya
Gentle Giant – Vadim Tverdyukov
and also the entire DEREVO and many, very many friends, actors, artists, children, musicians, dancers…
«…Six musicians are playing at parties. There’s a phone call and the party host sends a car for them. As they see it the guys realise that this party they will hardly forget: the car is constructed of shinbones of drug dealers, the sail is stitched from a thousand blue neckties of the GDR young pioneers, the driver is a Giant Albino of dying breed of Squirrelgoats…»
Such a one
«…the reviving well of laughter is getting dry, the bucket bangs against the mossy walls… Instead of a jolly joke it brings back just sadness in the green bottle of tarragon soda…»
DJ Cornflower
«… It will be a musical film. Even too musical..»
Emmanuel Brüskind
Anybody wishing to help out with the costumes, light and sound, props and make-up, with the lunch and general assistance, anybody wishing to be merry and quick-witted…. please e-mail us
Meanwhile Vadim Tverdyukov, Nikolay Gusev and Nastya Ponomareva are finishing the mixing and mastering of the Positive Band’s album „Cat on Accordion“…
And there’s more to come:
September, Faust by Alexander Sokurov is in competition at the Venice Film Festival.
(I should think about getting some tails)
A big theatrical project in Perm in Russia
AVIA concert in Yubileyny in St Petersburg
Preparations for the performance at the Mikhail Chemiakin’s art exhibition
«Sleeplessnes. Homer. Taut sails. I have read the catalogue of ship just halfway through…»
Text: Anton Adasinsky
English text editor: Daniel Williams
Photo: Elena Yarovaya, Roman Ekimov, Anton Adasinsky and others
Photo design: Elena Yarovaya
Video: Elena Yarovaya
Back in 1989 DEREVO was performing at OEROL for the very first time!
Aaaaah! Is it really so long ago???
22 years ago this Island made a new hardly noticeable companion to world re-knowned DEREVO theatre company.
Right there in the dunes, under the sky, on the endless sands, in the roaring wind and surf, there the unique principles of DEREVO’s dance have been elaborated. And they mean the mastering of huge spaces, laconic moves, purity of senses, precision in colours of the costumes and props, live music of nature…
Our improvisations here could be just four hours long, as well as nine days and nights without break, like in the „Adventures of the Golden Egg“.
And now at the thirtieth (!) anniversary OEROL Festival, on top of the hill, in an endless wind, blowing all the waste out of your mind and body, here DEREVO performs Mephisto Waltz.
No photograph could possibly convey the power of this place…
But still… here are some photo-visions…
Text: Anton Adasinsky
English text editor: Daniel Williams
Photos: Anna Bogodist, Elena Yarovaya
Photo design: Elena Yarovaya
See also one of the first online photo projects at DEREVO.org dedicated to the Island of Terschelling - Wind & Water »
I, Anton Adasinsky, am responsible for the news text.
Everyone is hurrying me.
Here, I wrote about my dream of a tunnel.
Daniel told me to stop writing a novel in the first person, people would need some facts, where have we been, where will we be, what have we done…
Here, I wrote about where we’ve been and what’s coming up
Lena Yarovaya told me that everyone knows it anyway and that a flatfish is hiding in the sand by using vibrations.
Here, I wrote about the flatfish, although it pretends to be a maggot there.
I’m tired now.
Just read all that you want. It’s just a troubled week of April.
We were in St.P.
HARLEKIN, MEPHISTO WALTZ, the workshop (there was quite a lot of people, about sixty or so). Then there were four days of dreaming up the DROP in the OCEAN.
Then I flew back to Dresden.
I’m not getting sic easily, you know. I mean any flu, quinsy and so on. But suddenly - bamm! I woke up and realise that I don’t want to go anywhere. I don’t want to go to the theatre. Rather I want to read something by James Fenimore Cooper. And I want a thermometer. It says to me: 38°.
Two days have passed like this. To me it’s just as unusual as reading my words in the press. Unusual but wonderful.
Now after a week in St.P., I have decided to end the story.
I’ve got a friend (yes, you can envy me). His name is Igor Timofeev. He lives on the outskirts of St Petersburg. He has a house, a sauna and twenty-eight guitars.
This place is my cavern. When I can’t cope anymore with hearing somebody else’s heart, I can escape there,into the sauna.
Everything describable just stops there. Words and actions change their meaning or lose it completely. We speak to each other there but subjects are not known to us and they’re not suggested by us.
He had a dream.
The manner, as he told it to me, refers to the special language of the steam room.
“raised on horizon… colour of the sky changed… like it was needed there… but they’re drawing here unnatural and a big piece… I unbuttonned the shirt to meet the punch… twenty seconds are still there… first light then I close my eyes then a sound, and in the sound I understand… stand and wait and then the air blows and it’s twisted… ribbed… I see the great playful movements of an accordion which you can touch with your hands… and the eyes flying towards you and me… do you understand!? I’m flying through the nuclear explosion and to my framework… to my skeleton everything is clean understand?? washed and cleaned and inflatable eyes maybe five meters large and I must turn them somehow…”
Then I could remember the rest of my own dream. I’ve never forgotten it to be honest.
I was running and following Pieretta to the stage. It’s a long tunnel. She’s lighter and faster, I wouldn’t be able to reach her. And suddenly I was not chasing her anymore but simply running, precisely and evenly. It was the run to the stage. I kissed my shoulder while I was running there.
On the opposite wall, there was a big letter “E” and then “A”. I realised that I must remember them, for I was running towards the beginning of these words. It’s not hard. When the letters were over I could put together the words “Heat Mode”. Now I was running directly towards the red glow. It was very easy to run.
We’ve added our dreams. I can’t quite remember what has happened after it. Nastya said something about a butterfly who gives a flower a slap in the face. We reproached her with poeticizing of men’s problems. However, the picture of that night has been completed: a butterfly and the hysterical kiss of a light bulb…
Ode to a one-day fly
The worm lying in a tight cocoon
Your life goes forth unhurried
You see no spring, you’re purposeless.
You’re sure you’re resting here for ever.
It’s so delightful, so silent here.
One year or two
But suddently there’s a coolness cracking in.
Scream, you worm! death is coming
Your shield is crackling and it’s scary. Scary!
The wind has blown away the pieces of the cocoon.
Are you dead? No, alive.
So what is that?
Where’s your house? Where’s the tightness and the dryness?
And the crushing there is again like thunder!
Behind your back two wonderful wings unfolded
And you are flying, you are singing.
Your day is in the sky, exposed to the wind
And to the sun of the world
You have been thinking this is death?
But this is life.
Exactly one day long.
Text: Anton Adasinsky
Photos: Elena Yarovaya, C. Friedlander, Lena Dolmatova, Roman Ekimov
Photo Design: Elena Yarovaya
In May Anton and the Positive Band hope to finish the promised CD “Cat on Accordion”. Meanwhile you can enjoy the new video by Andrey Gladkikh to the song “All Seasons” by Andrey Sizintsev, Nikolay Gusev and Anton Adasinsky.
We’re friends with AKHE. No more, and no less. Sometimes we hug each other when we meet. Sometimes we avoid each other for years. We’re women, in spite of our trouser’s length and our beards’ thickness.
Couldn’t go to the monkeys this year, cos’ I had to give my body some treatment. Hope somebody will bring them bananas.
Since there was some time for doing nothing, I decided to do nothing at the radon bath spa, not too far away from home.
You are usually only allowed to take a radon bath three times a week. And in this village radon saturation is supposed to be particularly strong. However, you can always talk to people, you know… Anyway, I was lying in a bath each day here.
And that’s what has happened.
It was sunny, the bath master covered me with some special cloth and rolled the tub right into the courtyard. It’s February, snow is everywhere and the sun is glistening. I was lying there with just my head sticking out of the tub.
I sneezed. A shadow darted behind me and then an owl landed on my stomach, well on the leather cloth that was lying on my stomach. I was afraid, as I should have been. In the corner of my eye I saw the bath master who was showing me what to do: to puff out your cheek and to beat it with a finger.
My arms were dipped in radon. The owl was very close. I freed my hand and tried to knock on my cheek. The owl shrugged his shoulders (it seemed so to me), retreated to the tub’s edge and aimed his double-barrel at me (i.e. he stared with his eyes). I didn’t have anything else to look at so I looked into his eyes.
Perhaps I fell asleep. Perhaps it was the radon. Perhaps that’s what I’m living for…
…I’m running somewhere amidst a crowd of people. It’s very loud, like a train station but during a celebration.
Behind the peoples’ backs I can see a performance. It’s AKHE. They’re hanging over the stage. Their legs and arms are in loops, all the furniture too. I can’t remember what they were doing but it was something simple. Everyone understands it and they all want to see more.
But it’s difficult to do, since the show is continuously sinking. There’s no stage floor and the audience runs one level down to see how the performance goes on.
The show is shorter here than usually. The sinking picks up the speed. AKHE are very concentrated
The structure of the ropes dictates something to them. They have never really been a theatre company. Everyone sees this now. Actually, they’re Guides on the Way Down when you are in this multi-leveled supermarket. I can’t run down with everyone else anymore. So I enter some department. Salesman warns me not to touch anything.
An unexpected outburst of fury. I smash something on the floor and run downstairs. There are fewer people here, and the movement of AKHE is even faster. I suppose they’re setting sail. They’re on the masts. I can guess what the ending is and I run down, deeper. Staff entrance. Deeper… There are several people around, just as serious as I am. A big hole above us and the applause can be heard from there. Pasha and Maxim are lowering unceasingly and precisely.
Some other spectators and I – all are men – are standing on the edge of a big pit filled with water. AKHE will sink down there in a moment. I will not stop it and I will not see it. I’m looking at the men all around. They’re very russian-looking – in grey and in black. On the contrary, the colours of AKHE are beautiful like the post stamps from Guinea.
I was staring at the owl. A light-bulb was blinking. It’s time to get out of the tub. My finger was on my cheek and rather frozen.
Text: Anton Adasinsky
English text editor: Daniel Williams
Photo: Elena Yarovaya, Silvio Dittrich, Anton Adasinsky
Photo design: Elena Yarovaya
.jpg "First DEREVO poster by V. Kuznetsov (aka-Giper-Puper), 1988")
_Photo_A_Adassinsky.jpg "From DEREVO Film DOPPIO. Photo - Anton Adasinsky")
_Photo_N_Ponomareva_1.jpg "Photo - Nastya Ponomareva")
Photo_N_Ponomareva.jpg "From DEREVO Film DOPPIO. Photo - Nastya Ponomareva")
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.jpg "Terschelling 2011. MEPHISTO WALTZ. Photo - Anna Bogodist")
.jpg "Terschelling 2011. MEPHISTO WALTZ. Photo - Anna Bogodist")
.jpg "Terschelling 2011. MEPHISTO WALTZ. Photo - Anna Bogodist")
.jpg "Terschelling 2011. Photo - Anna Bogodist")
.jpg "Terschelling 2011. MEPHISTO WALTZ. Photo - Anna Bogodist")
.jpg "Terschelling 2011. Photo - Anna Bogodist")
.jpg "05_A_Adasinskiy_Mephisto_Waltz_ph_Anna_Bogodist_(67)")
.jpg "15_E_Yarovaya_Mephisto_Waltz_ph_Anna_Bogodist_66)")
.jpg "09_19_6_2011_Anna_BOGODIST_(364)")
