My Granddad was digging, My Dad was digging and I will not

“It’s important to expose not only the social-political mechanisms, but also the theatrical ones. Especially in the theatre when the past and memory are expressed though fiction, which always wants to be seen as reality. Can the stage – a space of fictional characters, events and illusions, which we want to believe in – become the place where we can explore the mechanisms of memory and our complicated relationship with the past?”

What’s the connection between the individual and collective memory? Can collective memory suppress an individual one? Who tells us what to remember and what to forget? What makes history?

Within the context of theatre and its fictional nature 5 actors from different regions of the Ukraine and Poland explore their personal and shared pasts and memories through their individual experiences and histories of their countries.

This performance is a result of the project “Maps of fear/Maps of identity” which involved Polish theatre practitioners, theoreticians and nearly 40 artists from different regions of Ukraine (Zaporizhia, Lviv, Kherson, Kharkiv, Kyiv, Khmelnytskyi, Poltava, Odesa).

The project was implemented by Stowarzyszenie Praktyków Kultury (The Culture Practitioners Association/ Warsaw) together with Ukrainian organizations from Lviv, Kyiv, Kharkiv, Odesa and Kherson.

Co-financed by the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage of the Republic of Poland.

Supported by the East European Performing Arts Platform (EEPAP).

"My Granddad was digging, My Dad was digging and I will not" premiered on the 24th of September 2016 during the GogolFEST in Kiev, Ukraine. Ukrainian tour included performances in Lviv, Kharkiv, Kherson, Odessa.

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