And we gladly finish the long promised “news” about the great days in Mannheim. Nothing to add actually. Maybe I wasn’t in time to say one loud THANK YOU to everyone.

THANK YOU, guys! Great job. Fantastic project.

Hurry up, see the photos »

And in the end of October a film about the project must be ready. Wheel of Power, Will Power, Weal Power, Weel Power… whatsoever our participants: dancers, technicians, artists, managers from Italy, Russia, Holland, Germany, Japan, Mexico, Poland and one man from the North have tried to call or write it.

In November two weddings should tinkle in the world. Mannheim.

Text by Anton Adasinsky
English text editor: Jennifer Williams
Photo design: Elena Yarovaya based on the photos by Nicole von Hasselt

After uneasy and sleepless days in Mannheim (girls, tractors & night elegy) we found ourselves in Dublin. We were going to open the big Fringe festival. We couldn’t realize it at the start.

We really really wanted to sleep. Really.

What we could dance was maybe the sirtaki. And most likely only the first male part – slow and circumstantial.

And so we started. A dream on black waters at Hanon’s music. “Her Midst”. Hanon – is a pseudonym. I don’t think he would allow Skryabin to leave a wonderful greenhouse in the Pushkarskaya street in St. Petersburg without asking for permission.

The water wasn’t warm or clear. But it was happy that we gave our bodies to it. Just touch the water and some high-speed shimmering wonder connects you through all the brooks, rivers, seas and oceans to that peaceful creek where Krapp is hearing the sedge rustling against the bottom of his boat.

And then we performed in Samuel Beckett’s Theatre. A “happy days”…

Text: Anton Adasinsky
English text editor: Jennifer Williams
Photo: Elena Yarovaya, Andrey Bobylev
Photo design: Elena Yarovaya

See also the video shot by visual designers from Mercury Boy Inc. and originally posted at TheBubble.

Several ways of living for those who want to devote their life to the arts.

1. A person pursues his favourite occupation. In the remaining time he makes his living by simple physical labor that does not employ his art and skills.
2. A person limits his social requirements as much as possible and pursues his favourite occupation while living on alms.
3. A person divides his time between the favourite occupation and additional earning in the “art field” such as mass-media, TV, cinema, parties, bad productions, etc., understanding clearly that all those are just “hack work”.
4. A person pursues only his favourite occupation and, after spending years to achieve perfection in it, he reaches the time when his stage work allows him to survive in society ensuring him creative, financial and geographical independence.
5. A person understands that he won’t have enough time and energy to obtain independence through his favourite occupation, so in order not to sell himself he makes the decision not to pursue it or anything related to it, but instead to make money and pave the way for the creative independence and happiness of another person: Husband, Wife,
   Children, Friend.
6. A person finds a social structure or another person, which (or who) supports him, making it possible to be occupied only by his favourite art and not requiring “loafing”.
7. A person decides not to do anything at all and leaves for the monastery. He relies upon maintenance from a certain prosperous organization or person.
8. A person puts an end to his life.

It is necessary to assign names of people who you know well or of celebrities to each point of the list. For example: Bashlachev, Faulkner, Moguchiy, Nikitin, Makarevich, Modigliani, Maximov, Jodorowsky, before starting to tear your ass with a pike crankbait. The ways and methods of transition between the listed models are intriguing. Propose and try.

* Methodological blunders are commited in this text on purpose.

Original text: Anton Adasinsky.
Translation: Niki
English text editor: Jennifer Williams
Photos: Elena Yarovaya

I see my hands. They are stained with oil. Old cars are around me. Apparently I’m working in a garage. Alone.

There’s some annoyance in my sleep: should I change jobs? But there are obscure liabilities. This is not my dream. A sort of a junk movie.

I’m sure I’m handsome and manly. I search for a mirror and whistle something.

Powerful blows at the gates which open upwards slowly. Red-hot stripe of the sun-tide crawls the floor.

The customers are from the 30s. The blonde man remains in the car. The miniature girl comes out. She smokes a cigarette squinting in the sun.

Seems like I’m hearing jazz and realize – if the music stops I will be shot down. I know this pair. The girl is Bonnie Parker.

I know how they will die. She will turn 23.

One of my friends in St. Petersburg bought herself an old soviet government limousine. ZIM or something like that. Every little gap is filled with sand. Sort of bullet-proof doors.

It is possible to die in sleep. So I answer in good English that I recognize their faces; that I have no money in the garage but I point out the idea of car doors filled with sand. I’m showing them where I can put the sand in.

“Not bad”, says Bonnie (I will never be able to forget her voice),”but where would we get so much sand, my boy?”

“In a fire-protection bin” – I smile and want the blond guy to see that.

I’m going to the bin. Car’s door slammed. Maybe he’s got out. It’s hot in the car.

At last it’s summer.

Text: Anton Adasinsky
English text editor: Jennifer Williams
Photo: Elena YarovaYa, Roman Dubinnikov
Photo design: Elena Yarovaya

Dimmer is his name.

He just appeared before us as a common coordinator.

However, he could be anyone: scout, drug dealer, president, dancer,
seller of oranges, singer or ship’s captain. First encounter at the
airport – we see the proud silouette next to the car resembling
Tovstonogov’s profile. Scared a bit we approach him but the figure
instantly transforms itself to Louis de Funes. A light tumble and we
are heading toward the hotel already, laughing and crying.

A boy grown up in the streets of the Brazil Carnival. A jester and an
acrobat. In the old days – the star of Brazilian circus, and now – a
grayish bird, Dimmer. He plunged us into the night life of Brasilia.

None of us have seen him in all his height. Just in details. The
eyes, hands, flexible spine, flying eyebrows. He is everywhere and
nowhere. Roma apprehended him as a giant, Max saw a decrepit old
man….

Middle of the night. Knock on the door…

“Anton! Antonio!”
“Who is there?”
“It’s me – Dimmer”
“What’s happened?”
“Anton, thank you for the beautiful show, I’m so happy you are here…
and the public is so happy, and please come again and more… and so on…
but this is my last job here at the festival. My Voice is calling me.
I have to confess to the world, I need to record my LP “Penetrations”.
This is a musical where I play the lead and actually the only
role. It’s a large show. Whole Brasilia must be involved.

I will sit in a box and starve. There is a hole. The box is upholstered with fur.
Every resident of my beloved city must put his head in and look me in
my eyes. Every one! And if even one will not come to my box, I
will die. I’ve calculated. I can last about a month, 3 seconds per
person. The music will be written by Syd Barret. It doesn’t really
matter that he’s dead. Since I was a kid I rolled the “Dolly Rocker,
Dolly Rrrrrrrr…” under my tongue.” (He showed me how exactly he did
it).

“I would be very pleased if you would shout tomorrow – Hey, hey!
Goodbye, Dolly Rocker!”

In the morning Dimmer wasn’t the Night Guest anymore. We said goodbye
to each other, chilly.

Farewell Brazil. Goodbye Carnival. Goodbye the “red” Dimmer, even if
there was no you at all…

Text by Roman Gabria, Max Didenko, Anton Adasinsky
English text editor: Jennifer Williams
Photos by Elena Yarovaya, Maxim Didenko, Alisa Oleynik, Elena Shtykova
Photo design by Elena Yarovaya

“KOREA SONG”

ANTON–BUDA

Original text: Anton Adasinsky, Buda
English text editor: Jennifer Williams
Photos: Elena Iarovaia, Alisa
Photo design: Elena Iarovaia

There’s no chance to avoid the questions.

“Anton, what is your new performance “DIAGNOSE” about?”

I will search for the words again, not to offend someone and not to burst into tears because of the nonsense I’m talking.

OK. Apparently I’m a prosperous person. (Slava, give me back a million!). I don’t buy things. However I stare in the shops’ windows just like the Korean women stare at Dima Abramov.

DEREVO already has everything that may be necessary for the realization of creative ideas.

There’s a photo of Bonnie Parker in my purse next to the driving license, since she’s looking like Lena Iarovaia and Shtyk in their birthday suits.

I can’t eat. All the last ten years I have wanted to. My weight must be 59 kilograms. Between rehearsals and performances I go mad and shout at the partners. I’ve learned to sleep in the day and visit the places I need while sleeping.

So now to the “DIAGNOSE”.

April 2006 they found hepatitis C in some final form in me. We took the camera to the hospital.

In a shadeless voice the doctors said that I have three years more, the last of which definitely would not be pleasant. Alisa gave a silent hem and made a close-up of me. I was looking very angry.

Or there’s intensive therapy. Six months. According to the last statistics, positive chances for a cure are 37 percent against 63 percent negative. The medicine is new, its effects aren’t studied and well-tested yet. I wouldn’t be allowed to stay among people because of the side effects – depression, weakness, fiber, claustrophobia and more. It would be possible under the constant supervision of a doctor. It would be a chance.

I agreed to try the therapy and expended a lot of energy and paper to avoid the hospital. 672 pills, 96 pricks. In Edinburgh I weighed 55 kilograms already and was convinced that the consequences of this chemistry are really unknown and thought that they should analyze me.

Various things happened to me. I hardly remember the performances. The guys knew the story and were bearing up well. However they say I wasn’t completely myself.

After the sixth medical examination right before the “Totentanz” action in the Dreikönigskirche in Dresden in March 2007 my dear doctoress said that I had won. Alisa photographed her hands. We were hugging a little bit longer than usual.

I told the guys about it. As I heard my voice I realized that it was another Anton. The old one disappeared some time that summer. All my performances after Edinburgh: “Mad in Japan”, “Wolve’s Tango” in Kronstadt, “x0” and all the actions and dances, and “ROBERT’S DREAM” and the “DIAGNOSE”, and interviews, and the white contact lenses – they all are creatures of another human being.

So we are living with it so far.

A form of the performance: reconsideration of the Great Love that covered the sky in March 2006. A task of the performance: to meet the old Anton.

I will wear clothes in the performance.

Original text: Anton Adasinsky
English text editor: Jennifer Williams
Photo: Anton Adasinsky, Maxim Didenko, Elena Iarovaia
Photo design: Elena Iarovaia

Robert has traveled to Italy; visited the city where he was born and shot his
doctor dead.

At the 13th Russian national theatre festival “Zolotaya Maska” (Golden Mask) in Moscow DEREVO received an award in the category “Innovation”.

Text by Anton Adasinsky
Photo: Elena Iarovaia and/or DEREVO
Photo design: Elena Iarovaia

After the «Mad_in_Japan» project in St. Petersburg DEREVO came to Japan with a project «Mad_in_Russia». And there are lots of things happened on that days. More about it in the upcoming news. And for now just some photos:

More photos »

Text: Anton Adasinsky
Photo: Elena Iarovaia, Hideo Tanaka, DEREVO & others.
Photo design: Elena Iarovaia

For the Carnival in Venice there are Slava Polunin, Mikhail Chemiakin, Anton Adasinskiy & DEREVO, Dmitry Shagin, seven small and four tall people gathered, as well as many more artists.

Original text by Anton Adasinsky
English text editor: Jennifer Williams
Photo by Elena Iarovaia, Mirella Lampertico
Photo design by Elena Iarovaia

Alternative Text »

I received a letter. My fear of pathological frankness turned my letter to myself into a letter from myself to him. Both situations are true. Well. It’s hard to explain on the phone.

Hi, Sveta!

We don’t see each other often, but I know you surf the Internet sometimes. I will write openly here.

“…Darling, you’ve got mixed up with a devil…“ – it’s from some opera, actually.

Probably DEREVO is beautiful and perfect on stage when you’re looking from a distance, from the back rows. And afterwards – in your dreams and remembrances.

Don’t come closer. You’ll see details, nuances. You’ll see stupid everyday training; notes, doubts, tears. A simplified language of illiterate machines, which have only two tasks: to build the bridge between the body and sensation, to weaken the commanding system of the brain; and another one – to live in a fairytale, to live in an eluding world, and to drag the lovely public in there without asking for their permission.

A fist.

There are exercises and exercises. The system developed by DEREVO, which we still follow, affects the complexity of human perception of the world: emotional, physical and mental.

Now after many years of work I can say that the consequences are irreversible and lead the participants of the experiment too far beyond.

Unfortunately I’m on the threshold of insanity too.

Anton.

On February 5th, 2007, DEREVO performed an action “The Squirrel” in the “Osobnyak” theatre in St. Petersburg.

Text by Anton Adasinsky
Photo by Elena Iarovaia, Anna Bogodist
Photo design by Elena Iarovaia

I eagerly await the night time.

I welcome those heavy cloud-palms which hide me from the sun, the shining eye of the cyclops-god.

There’s no anxiety or misery in my dreams. Or at least I do not actually sense any anxiety. There are deaths and flights, seas, pursuits and love.

Several times a day I try to do one of DEREVO’s exercises; sitting still on a bench with half-shut eyes, trying to remember pictures from my dreams and project them onto the reality of my daytime existence.

I’m on a ship. People. There are many of them. Running from one side of the deck to the other. The schooner is pitching. I recall the names of the ships in my dream. Caravel, Frigate, Clipper, Junk. I murmur in my sleep, “Junk, Junk”.

I jump overboard. An overgrown shore. I’m saved and checking for injuries. An agitated groin.

I’m threading my way to the shore through the wet sedge. A long and lonely life lies ahead. Happiness.

At the water’s edge there is a rubber ball rotting in the water. It’s neither big nor small. A small mark on the upper side. A little bit out of shape, but it still causes a smile. I want to kick it but I can’t. My long dress is clinging to my legs.

They call me to dinner. They call me Robert. I’m arrogant and apparently wealthy. After dinner a doctor comes. I know he’s lying when he tells me that I’ll die, but I want him to. He asks me to undress. I refuse. I can sense where the boundary lies between the silk reality of my dress and the world of the dream. There is silence in the castle.

“ROBERT’S DREAM” was premiered in Dresden. And within a week of arriving in St Petersburg we already know that we’ll change everything in it.

We were happy to receive a note from a great musician. Please find some time (there is enough of it for all of us) and listen to his music. “Rock Bottom” for instance.

Hello Anton,

Good Luck,
Robert (Wyatt)

Original text by Anton Adasinsky
English text editor: Julius Green
Photo by Elena Yarovaya, Carola Fritzshe, Alisa, Shtyk
Photo design by Elena Yarovaya

See photos of “ROBERT’S DREAM” »»

Very simple and very good news.

DEREVO rehearses a new work, “ROBERT’S DREAM” - and it’s very good. The New Year is coming soon, and it’s very good too.

It’s good that the Winter is not here yet. But it will come, believe in it. It will be good as well. The crazy crowd in the stores, and the punch, and Christmas trees on the streets, and the colourful lights, and the shining punks, and the cheerful handicapped persons, and nobody buying any newspapers.

I’m used to the fact that lots of things are unchangeable and that the tears of change do turn me on.

There’s only place for one at the top of the mountain. It is very lonely and windy there.

You always want to meet everyone but then you remember that you did not call the most important one, simply forgot, while he or she maybe wasn’t so far away. You don’t like to come across friends in queues. No, wrong. The other way round. There is a reason to open your eyes wide and wish lots of happiness… Oh Lord, why not on every single day and not to everyone?

English text editor: Jennifer Williams
Photo & color grading: Elena Iarovaia

At the Tanzherbst Festival Anton Adasinskiy and Lena Iarovaia presented their work „X0“.

“Lena, thank you! It was light and easy”

I was smiling at the rehearsal, at the performance too. Now I remember that and smile.

Critics called this action – “A piece for Two Living Humans”.

At the Festival “VERTICAL 2006 - Stop in Time” DEREVO has met the indian dancers and they have met DEREVO. What it resulted in - see and read, while we have to go… to go…

Photo: Anna Bogodist, Anna Khokhlova, Elena Smirnova, Di, Alisa
Editing & colour grading: Elena Iarovaia