How wonderful. The number Pi!
Now we know everything!
No more secrets, everything has been revealed!
All questions answered!
Even if they were never asked!
Now we know names, prices, how many freckles Amelia has, the temperature on Phobos, we know that tomorrow is Tuesday,
We know Odin’s DNA, we know there are five fingers, six senses and seven sins.
We know four wives are allowed.
And that there will be no war on 16th of March.

We know that everything is possible!!
And we know that we don’t need to do anything.

People have made a lot!
So much. Much is already broken or rusted.
No problem! We’ll produce more!
Everything is counted, painted, discarded, bought, used, hidden, resold, shared, smothered in kisses and forgotten.

In Leipzig the police shot down a drone flying over the city centre.
It crashed with its cargo – a teddy bear.
Someone wanted to deliver a gift in an original way.
Well?? Come on, go to the shop, buy a second bear and march forward!
On foot, as you were!
To personally dispatch the gift into happy little hands.

That’s it!
Everybody’s free, at last.
No need to think or gossip, to search for the truth, clarifiy. Nothing to talk or exchange opinions about.

We know everything!

2017 for me was four kg of Plutonium.
Not enough critical mass.
And then, finally, it exploded, and this shimmering haze suddenly condensed in my head, the mosaic began to melt, and mixing in wonderful streaks, the lava of ravings and consciousnesses flowed down to the shore of my one and only river, hissed on the wet sand and began to cool.
I’ll wait for a while
And then I’ll hop over the still warm stone into the water
To bathe.

Text: Anton Adasinsky
English text editor: David Kemp
Photos: Elena Yarovaya, Julia Obraztsova

Text: Anton Adasinsky
English text editor: David Kemp
Photos: Katja Pietrusky, Roman Ekimov, Elena Yarovaya

English text editor: David Kemp
Photo & Video: Makhina Dzhuraeva

I’ve started rehearsals of the new project dedicated to Osip Mandelstam at the Gogol Centre in Moscow.
Chulpan Khamatova ― the Soul
I ― the Chitin of a Poet
and eight of the coolest guys from Kirill Serebrennikov’s troupe. We have already worked together in “Who Is Happy In Russia”.

Made the first photo proofs for my solo work “The Well-Tempered Clavier”. My knowledge of Uber-Marionette theory will be put to a full use here.
Lena Yarovaya did 12 solo performances at the medieval fair in Dresden.

We’re going to Edinburgh! What for? I do not know. No. I know.
There, in Edinburgh, we’re at home, on the street every second person - an artist, and the bartenders are not versed in art worse than the pros from the Scotsman or Herald.
Why are we bringing ONCE… ?
It’s more complicated to answer.
Four years we’re searching for fun for our kids ― a task more and more difficult.
A serious and troubled world doesn’t do much for children.
Hard times.
And you can’t go far with cartoons from the 50s and 60s.
And I want to take them to the theatre, a fairy-tale. Splendid and rich…
And even more, I MYSELF want to go to a good film. And that takes a long time to find.

Although “good” ― it’s not the right word. Well… at least I don’t want any morals: children are smarter than adults; drinking is bad; insects are aliens (or vice versa); Galápagos giant tortoises sacrifice themselves to stop evolution…

From the first line, the first picture, the first sound, I know whether they will eat a piece of my life… or… suddenly the heart beats stronger, the sparks run around my fingers and someone’s soul embraces my face like an oxygen mask. I, after all, like everyone else, I guess, someday everything will be fine. And I have to believe that in these hidden dreams I am not alone.

“ONCE…” ― it is eternal. Like Robinson Crusoe or Gagarin, or artificial snow under the Christmas tree, like a thundering old tram, like the drumming of domino stones in the backyard.
A ray of light leaves my chest and turns to a moon. It rises to the stars and suddenly there’s a shadow! It’s me. I’m so small, crossing the moonpath on a toy comet!
And this is what I’m ready to watch forever.
During August, every day we will catch a Miracle by the ear.

Anton

Text: Anton Adasinsky
English text editor: David Kemp
Video: Andrey Gladkikh
Photos: Makhina Dzhuraeva, Elena Imamova, Igor Fomin

P.S. Such an irony: yesterday in the middle of the show the fire alarm has set off, so the audience and we too - accompanied by friendly clapping - were escorted outside. We spent a couple of relaxed minutes in the sun together with Mary Brennan.

see also / siehe auch / см. также: http://www.derevo.org/live/275

I spent a week in StP.
A record for meetings and conversations.
Meetings all about organising DEREVO’s work in St. Petersburg.
I was not on my own for one minute.
I met the Committee for culture, theaters, directors, officials, students …

Two days of rest and now I try to analyze my feelings

1. This happened in some other world. With this world DEREVO never was connected.
2. I was always in danger in these days.
   • Danger to look independent.
   • Danger to make a compromise.
   • Danger to be misunderstood. Danger of too many jokes. Danger to absorb the private lives, which pour from virtually every interlocutor.
   • Danger to get sick at heart seeing all these people’s insecure plans.
3. When there are millions of troubled people all around you - you will be troubled. The dream is gone. Just whisky and music.
4. Desire to vacuum and clean the shoes.
5. Flashes of anger with vendors and taxi drivers - never had this before.

I leaned too far out of the trench. Could be shot.

The last day, two students came to say their goodbye and thanks for the master class. To speak of the work, I forbade them. They asked - is it possible to smoke.

I gave permission. They smoked a joint and the smell drew from memory a distant morning when I woke up in space. It was 4 am. And from the window flowed a sound that did not belong to Leningrad, nor to the USSR nor to our damp morning courtyard …
I remembered how I went to the window and sat on the windowsill for forty minutes …
My 17 years have been dismissed by the judge. I’ve started from the beginning.

And I did the same thing!
I put an ancient speaker in the window and turned on “Wish you were here” …
But something strange has happened. Soon we became scared.
I reduced the volume - the fear never left.
I turned off everything and had to close the window to calm down.
I showed the girls a book, just bought that evening.
Searched for three years and bought it!
The first small edition of his book “Stone” that Mandelstam paid for himself in 1913.
300 small books that changed my world, and not only mine … We read the poems ….
and Pink Floyd came off and flew back home…
I sang page 8 to them.
That’s all.

Then the taxi and the familiar: “Do you mind turning off the radio?”

Text: Anton Adasinsky
English text editor: David Kemp

Video:

Lyrics by Osip Mandelstam
Music composed and performed by Roman Dubinnikov
Photos from DEREVO archive by various photographers

with
Anton Adasinsky
Nikolay Gusev
Alexei Rakhov
Victor Vyrvich
Igor Timofeev
Veronica Golubeva
Sasha Harinova

Video and Photography : Nastasia Maslennikova, Eva Kuligina
Sound : Seva Gakkel, Mark Titov
Editing : Nastasia Maslennikova, Eva Kuligina
Production Assistant : Alexandre Senin, Olga Ogneva
Producer : Seva Gakkel

In association with 3MostA Hotel and Erarta Museum and Galleries of Contemporary Art

see also: http://balconytv.com/v/positive-band-his-eyes-balconytv

Hello all,

in October 2014 you can see & listen to Anton Adasinsky on many occasions in St Petersburg:

• autumn school at the New Stage of Alexandrinsky Theater, 7-10 Oct.
• on-line on BalconyTV with the Positive Band, 7 Oct.
• at the talk & film evening at the Angleterre Cinema, 11 Oct
• at the special event for the Mikhail Chemiakin Foundation, 13 Oct.

In the meantime you can watch the documentary (in Russian) “With a rainbow in the heart” by Galina Korshikova. Unique archive footage by Andrey Gladkikh has been used for this film.

Here you’ll find some pictures of our summer projects

• White Fortress, finally I’ve got the main part since Pavel Semchenko of AKHE was busy elsewhere
• Pioneers Parade at Radebeul, it’s all about having fun
• Midnight Balance at Radebeul
• Finale Grande at Radebeul, ten thousands wood pieces and five thousand spectators

Text: Anton Adasinsky
Photo: Elena Yarovaya, Silvio Dittrich, Anton Adasinsky, Igor Fomin, A. Rummler

Hello to you, Gods!
I’m writing with a big “G”, hoping that you’re not snorting offended and that you’ll read it to the end.
Greetings to all of you!
To the sly and bearded, to the bald and invisible, to the painted and gilded, to those of clay or wood, to the unspeakable.
Did I forget someone?
Oh.. there was another one of Sun Ra descendants, born in a joint.

As I can see you’re working hard and diligently.
Wars and more wars, deaths, hunger…
And those are not wars because of princesses or fields or land.  Rather because of yourselves, my dears.

But you’ll have no success after all…
You’d better meet somewhere up in your clouds to measure your strengths or the lengths of your tongues..

And we shall keep making people happy. You cannot stop us!

I’ll outlive you!
And don’t you dare to lay the blame for the miseries of humankind on the Devil!

“The devil’s role has been greatly exaggerated”, Alexander Sokurov

I’ll outlive you, you cardboard figures…

Happy New Year, people!
Go on, do your business!
You were born to be happy!
So be happy!

Anton Adasinsky
DEREVO group

post scriptum

I’ve been asked about it many times…
But didn’t want to answer.
Now I’ll say:
While working on the Faust filmset I’ve been through many things.
Every day some “signs”, “encounters”, “visions”…

I thought I couldn’t cope with it.
However, the Old Pulteney and Morton Feldman were of great help.

Some time later the sensations subsided. But mirrors and the sound of the wind still can get on my nerves…

Therefore I’m writing in the first person.
Though in the meantime I’m not quite sure of it.

“ONCE…” final bows have been filmed on 28 Dec. 2013 at the Festspielhaus Hellerau in Dresden

Camera: Makhina Dzhuraeva
On stage: Anton Adasinsky, Elena Yarovaya, Tatyana Khabarova, Oleg Zhukovsky, Pavel Alekhin
Sound: Daniel Williams
Light: Falk Dittrich
Management: Isolde Matkey

Text: Anton Adasinsky
English text editors: Daniel Williams, David Kemp
Video: Makhina Dzhuraeva

I was quite full of wonder after my brief visit to Moscow to the Lumiere Gallery.

I hadn’t expected that so many people were still able to walk slowly and speak gently, to look into your eyes and even to listen to you without meddling with their iphones right in front of your face. I’m speaking of the visitors to the exhibition and to my gig there.

The exhibition Time of the Bells is a VERY GOOD one. Thank you to Nastya and all other organisers behind the scenes.

Meanwhile the DEREVO studio in Dresden has been turned into a filming location. A motion picture in progress is:

The Middle of White (working title)

Idea: Pavel Semchenko (AKHE)
Director: Pavel Semchenko
Cast: Anton Adasinsky (DEREVO)
Cameraman: Andrey Gladkikh
Assistant: Natalia Krymskaya
Producer: Pavel Semchenko

Big thanks to Elena Yarovaya and Isolde Matkey for their support with the boring administrative tasks.

We will tell nothing yet about the music. That will be a surprise.
Anton

(english text editor: Daniel Williams)

Also the heavy metal performance by DEREVO is nearing:

29 – 31 March 2013 in Festspielhaus Hellerau, Dresden

The golden classic by DEREVO to be presented by the original cast & crew.

On stage:
Oleg Zhukovsky
Elena Yarovaya
Tatyana Khabarova
Anton Adasinsky

Sound: Dmitry Abramov
Light: Falk Dittrich

Anton Adasinsky performs his song Cat on Accordion from the Album DOPPIO live at Lumiere Centre in Moscow, 9th of March 2013. On stage are Alexandra, Veronika, Anton & Nikolay

Download the album DOPPIO here »

DEREVO has brilliantly performed MEPHISTO WALTZ last year at the OEROL.

But I was somehow uneasy. Not quite settled. Not entirely.

This is the island of DEREVO.

Every blade of grass knows us here.

But the guys didn’t go through that all yet.

They’ve got it delivered directly, the audience, the success.

MEPHISTO WALTZ is a show. Precise and ready-made body.

So now, one year later, they have to attend some other classes: the Street and the Body.

Just as we were doing it then.

In the sunlight and with no music playing back. Same costumes, same asphalt, same wind and a sand…

It just must be.

The steps of a big staircase should not be skipped.

This is a way of learning. I think about it rather often lately.

Anton

Meanwhile DEREVO School on Wheels has finished their performances at the ROBODOCK 2012 (you may remember the name from the huge project in Mannheim)…

On June 15th there’s a ten days long performances marathon on Terschelling island begins, at the OEROL festival.

A lot of things was started for DEREVO there some time ago. And a lot of things for the OEROL.

We’ll keep you up-to-date about the daily performances and improvisations.

You’ll see the dunes, the sea, the horses and the Moon and our guys among all these beautiful things…

Performers:

• Nastya Ponomareva (Lunis)
• Pavel Alekhin (Gleb)
• Makhina Juraeva (Marat)
• Anya Raicheva (Raja Ancheva)

We wish you and us were there…

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