In May 2020, locked down, I am constructing Pokrov: the cube 2x2 m, in which I can walk, wearing it as a garment and mobile shelter. I am wearing it on the streets and surrounding landscape of my native town (Izhevsk, Udmurtia, Russia). Revisiting the places that hold memories of my childhood, I am hidden from the surroundings and gazes to contemplate my current identity and belonging to this land in intimate touch with its soil. The beginning of the war in Ukraine collapsed my ideas of coming back there to live, work and love. From then on I knew that my future was to become a nomadic European. Pokrov fled the country of origin; this chapter was filmed in Sakartvelo (Georgia) near the Russian border. What does it mean “to belong” now, here, if you are forcefully displaced by war and a carrier of culture and language of bygone colonizers and current occupants of the land?
The event is a pre-program of the festival Improspekcije, and is organized in collaboration with gallery Novo, Metamedia Association and Object of dance association. Improspekcije is an initiative, started in 2007, dedicated to the development and affirmation of the improvisation scene in Croatia, as well as organizing international and interdiciplinary exchange in the field of improvised performance. The project takes place through the form of performances, workshops, research platforms and ongoing open conversations and it culminates in an annual festival format.