Director: Nina Khyzhna
Composer: Nick Acorne
Performers: Artem Vusyk, Dmytro Tretiak, Vladyslava Chentsova, Nina Khyzhna
Support: Monika Knegel, Victoria Fux
Producer: Theatre Nafta (Ukraine) & Theatre im Bahnhof (Austria)

Premiere: 2022
Duration: 90 min
Language: Ukrainian with English and Lithuanian surtitles
Age: 17+
*Intense sounds and some swear wors are used in the performance

There was this darkness, strange feeling. There was a kind of grey fog here. Invisible, but you constantly feel it, even when you breathe and everything around you seems to be polluted. I don't know how to explain it. All the buildings are the same, all the streets are the same, people seemed almost the same, but everything was kind of gloomy. They seem to have brought with them some kind of gloomy air, I think… damn, it's my city, what I’ve always known and they brought here the smell of death.

Quote from the performance

The city in which we live is our extended personal space, as large as we can reach by foot, sight, and thought. It encompasses the streets, squares, benches, and cafes we have chosen – the places where we feel safe and at home. But what happens when the arteries of our beloved city are torn by the tanks of occupying troops?

The Kharkiv creators from Nafta Theatre, led by director Nina Khyzhna, have created the documentary performance Nobody Died Today, revealing their personal traumas and the collective traumas of their city and Ukraine. Movement, physical experience, and the physical presence of the audience play crucial roles in the performance. The original music for the performance was composed by Nick Acorne.

Nobody Died Today is a documentary performance based on the stories, reflections, and insights of Ukrainian soldiers, volunteers, and the play’s creators. It explores their internal transformations, revaluation of values, perception of time and space, and sense of belonging.

How do artists survive when war breaks out? Do they still have the right to create, or must they take up arms? Can you be a pacifist when your country is being attacked by the enemy? Why is it important to have a place where you can be understood with half a word, and why do you feel the pull to return to it and defend its freedom?

While sharing personal stories – both their own and those of other people – the Ukrainians reflect on the experiences thrust upon them by the war: the proximity of death, the constant search for safety, anger, fatigue, life in unfamiliar places, and constant arguments with pacifism supporters. In response to ideas of “peace at any cost,” distancing, and “war fatigue,” they proclaim a kind of manifesto: “We don’t know how long this war will last, who will return home, who will remain alive, and what the price will be for our right to be free. We didn’t plan to be soldiers, volunteers, medics, or to leave our homes. We didn’t choose this war, but we must win it. This performance was created to give voice to the stories of our friends who are now risking their lives to defend what we love.”

Nafta Theatre is an alternative independent theatre founded in Kharkiv in 2018. Nafta is an open theatre platform that does not have a permanent company and does not follow classical canons. Actors, directors, musicians, choreographers, and painters can join Nafta with their ideas, gather a team, and initiate new theatre projects.

According to the creators, Nafta stands for openness, experimentation, new forms, and creative synergy. The goals the artists set for themselves are “to destroy standards, break boundaries, and burn with content.”

Events website: http://www.sirenos.lt