In early March, the Hvorostovsky Krasnoyarsk Opera and Ballet Theatre will host the premiere performances of two modern one-act ballets based on the myth of the Snow Maiden - Another Light and Refraction.

The project was launched in Kaluga in 2021: there, the Bolshoi Theatre of Russia held A Body in the Leading Role laboratory for choreographers at the festival of contemporary choreography DanceInversion. 20 young choreographers from all over Russia learned to express artistic ideas through the body of a dancer. At the end of the training at the Dance Union festival in Kaluga in January 2023, seven professional concepts for future productions based on the myth of the Snow Maiden were presented. The project was called The Snow Maiden: Myth and Reality. These ideas are embodied in shows at music theatres in the regions of Russia.

The Hvorostovsky Krasnoyarsk Opera and Ballet Theatre chose two one-act ballets to participate in the project - Another Light to the music by Oleg Lyubimov and Refraction to the music by Andreas Moustoukis. Another Light is a production by choreographer Irina Kononova (Stavropol); it’s about the dual nature of people. The ballet Refraction is choreographed by Aliona Britvak (Moscow) and explores the distortion and replacement of mother and daughter love.

Krasnoyarsk spectators will see the premiere performances on March 7 and 8, 2024. On April 2 and 3, the shows will be presented at the Theatre of Nations in Moscow within the International Festival of Contemporary Dance DanceInversion.

“The choice of the fairy tale The Snow Maiden for our project was not accidental at all. This tale is a concentrated epic of Russian life. This is a national myth that encodes all the ethical and moral values of our people. Exploring the spirit of this myth, the young choreographers tried to present it in the context of modern times for people living in the 21st century. In their productions, the choreographers of The Snow Maiden will speak to the audience in the language of contemporaneousness, and each spectator will be able to understand a set of familiar spiritual and national values. What the project will show to the spectators are new dimensions of what seems to be an already memorized folk image. Usually, myths and epics turn into fairy tales, which we then tell our children. Our duty is to decipher these myths for them and tell them that these are not just fairy tales - these are our mistakes, our successes. These are stories about the reality,” explained the project’s playwright Margarita Moyzhes.