Matthias Schönijahn
Who’d Have Thought That Snow Falls
Location: Frankfurt LAB (Gallus)
Performance/Installation
- 17.12.2022, 7.30 pmChoose your ticket price: € 7 / € 11 / € 20 / € 35, Artist-talk afterwards
Like windows, three large-format projection screens hang in the empty space. On them are images – landscapes from the Luhansk region and Ukrainian women which were recorded in April/May 2021 when Russian tanks already threatened the border. Their chants alternate with a choir interacting with them live and in dialogue. But even though they are separated by time and space, the impression is of a strong connection between the here and the there. This production asks about the effect of the voice. How are traumas inscribed in the voice passed down through generations? The performative installation is not only a touching sound and image experience, but can also be understood as a time capsule for future generations.
Duration: 80 minutes
Language: Ukrainian, no language skills required
Cast & Credits
Director, Camera, Videoediting, Stage-design: Matthias Schönijahn
Composition, Sounddesign: Martyna Poznańska
Choir-direction, Choir-composition: Paulina Miu Kühling
Dramaturgy, choreographic Collaboration: Rose Beermann
Co-conception Composition, Field/choir recording: Johannes van Bebber
Video dramaturgy: Ljupcho Temelkovski
Light-design: Maika Knoblich
Sound, Video-projection, technical Direction: Johannes Plank
Outfits: Ewa Brokos
Music-ethnological Consulting: Vlada Rusina
Production management: Birgit Voigt
Production management Ukraine: Valera Zherih
Directing assistance, Translation: Tereza Yakovyna
Berlin based Amateur-Singers: Agnieszka Bułacik, Ewa Brokos, Claudia Eckstein, Mina Djordjević, Katharina Fischer, Agnieszka Kucharska, Natalia Latecka, Julia Legezynska, Joana Katarzyna Pietras, Ola Zielińska.
Singers Ukraine: Lyudmyla Shulyak, Petro Chepelukha, Valentyna Derkach, Lyudmyla Horshkova, Oksana Hutnyeva, Lyudmyla Ilarionova, Tetyana Kandyba, Yuriy Kuznetsov, Yuriy Maksymenko, Anna Nevidoma, Nataliya Shepilova, Oleh Volkov, Tetyana Zaytseva, Ol’ha Bushlya, Lyubov Molochkova, Mariya Sahradova, Zinayida Skovorodka, Kateryna Tkachenko, Tetyana Hrabchuk, Lyubov Kornienko, Rayisa Shuhaylo, Svitlana Konovalova
Photos: Stefanie Kulisch
Funded by Hauptstadtkulturfonds, Fonds Darstellende Künste. The performance in Frankfurt takes place within the framework of „Frankfurt LAB – Emerging Artists Program 2022”, kindly supported by the Crespo Foundation and the Stiftung Polytechnische Gesellschaft Frankfurt am Main as well as the BHF BANK Foundation and the Adolf und Luisa Haeuser-Stiftung für Kunst- und Kulturpflege. In cooperation with Künstler*innenhaus Mousonturm.
More Information
In April – May 2021, the artist and director Matthias Schönijahn and a German, Polish, Ukrainian team (Vlada Rusina, Tereza Yakovyna, Valera Zherih, Paulina Miu Kühling, Johannes van Bebber) traveled to the north of the eastern Ukrainian region of Luhansk. In the eighth year of the war and under the omens of an imminent invasion by Russia, which had already massed troops along the eastern border, the team met with singing collectives. Together they made video-, vocal- and fieldrecordings that became the basis of the installation “Who’d Have Thought That Snow Falls”. Under the direction of Paulina Miu Kühling, a project choir of amateur singers was founded, which explored their voices with the technique of „open“ singing and learned songs from Luhansk. The Berlin- based sound artist Martyna Poznańska developed several ambient compositions based
on field recordings made during the trip, which connect the chants and videos.