Russia
Courtesy of The Arts Council, the British Council and the EU Step Beyond Fund, Felix and Josh (along with Dan and Alex also of RIFT) spent the last ten days in Russia developing ideas for a collaboration with Russian company Le Cirque De Charles Le Tannes. Felix and Josh were hosted by company members Sasha, Yuri and Misha and split their time in Russia between Suzdal and Moscow. We spent this time developing ideas and fact-finding about a piece they want to create in Russia in collaboration with Le Cirque called ‘Palace of Youth’. Felix continues the story here.
We were met off the intimidatingly rusty train in Moscow by Sasha our erstwhile guide. Shades of Eastern Europe and Albania echoed through the architecture and gave clues to this country which we grew to become increasingly curious about; the culture, ideas and ambitions not entirely dissimilar to our own but refracted from what we expected.
Driving through the wide Moscow streets, the Cyrillic alphabet, bombastic architecture set the tone for the rest of the trip. We arrived at the small flat that was used as Sasha's company Playtronica's office. Sparsely decorated, fronted by a steel double door, a couple of mattresses were strewn on the floor along with piles of electronic equipment and a board adorned with post it notes setting out a plan for that company which extended their reach far west.
We left he flat quickly and skipping over torn up pavement, which we would later learn was a renovation across the city for which Sasha's Playtronica mate Andrea was responsible. We walked down the garden ring (a circular road lined with trees) to Hermitage Gardens. A large outdoor bar spilled onto manicured lawns. We ordered mackerel sandwiches and beers and sunk into the balmy Moscow evening. Later we met Aglaya, Sasha's girlfriend at an art exhibition and made our way to a small bar in a converted motorcycle repair shop. Next door a sparse wine bar accessible only by RFID card.
Conversation lurched from graphic design to London's cultural dominance, the rise of craft breweries and the performance which was staged in London. Sasha and Aglaya knew many of the people crowded into the car park, in the wine bar Aglaya showed us some hand drawn wavy lines which later appeared on banknotes and tattooed onto her arm.
Returning home, a hot night on the sofa, at 3am a loud banging continued for hours. Andre, the owner of the flat had been locked out after filming in Siberia. Our first Russian faux pas.
The next morning, a walk, then a coffee and a chat with Andre about his time at Bristol University and working for the BBC as a fixer, at the design institute that was digging up the roads, Strelka, and now freelance for Sasha's music project Playtronica. Despite not quite being able to read the Russian character we think he forgave us for the hour that he spent banging on the door of his own flat.
Later that day, we set off to Suzdal, a small town 8 hours away from Moscow. Piling into Sasha's car we steamed out of Moscow past monuments and listening to esoteric jazz, we stopped briefly chocolate once, but eventfully made it to a large house in a small town complete with Russia's oldest Kremlin and many onion dome churches.
We settled into the house quickly, welcomed warmly by Lena and Vladimir, her sister and family. We were constantly given food and a place to stay above the winter fire complete with babushka doll. The town, geared up for tourists, was filled with souvenir shops, a large parade of souvenir tents and cafes. The biggest influence on the town was the eight or ten churches which flanked a beautiful river. We swam many times in the river which ran through it's hear and undoubtably was just as attractive to visiting nobles and clergymen when the city was first founded as it was for us in 2016. As darkness descended Yuri texted Sasha telling him that the performance would start at midnight, we made our way to the site of the house, a commune in the middle of nowhere next to a fishing lake where Андри Попов had his base.
Inherited from a russian landowner who had no need for it the several adhoc buildings, an outdoor kitchen and two houses the floors filled with sleeping bags, matts, children with no parents scuttled around our knees accompanied by kittens all scorched by the sun. Andrei Popov placed himself at the centre of proceedings greeting us abruptly; bronzed. Most furniture was refashioned from benches which we were told by the family we were staying with was produced by Popov for the streets of Moscow. Benches with paintings splashed on them. That sold for hundreds, here they’d been repurposed the kitchen tables, beds, walls. We spent hours here lying around blending in with the itinerant artists and students who poured through the house, waiting expectantly for some kind of purpose.
Returning to Suzdal, the family gathered us for a meal of soup, black-bread and fish, conversation was sped along stilted but jovial. After a brief respite we were joined by another family and Vladimir began to prepare another dinner: a barbecue. Was the other dinner a pre-dinner? How many meals a day do Russians eat? We sat around with plastic plates drinking wine out of disposable glasses which were later washed, without warning, the family who didn't speak much English broke into song. Looking at Sasha, had the performance begun? Was this all for us? Was this some kind of test an experiment? Our glasses were charged with honey cognac and the singing, a traditional set of drinking songs in A minor key continued. After dinner we learned this family toured the 86 cities in the UK.
We waited around until we were summoned to an anonymous meeting place next to what looks like an old train station. We drove deep into the night, and gathered, like the beginning of a happening. A large van arrived the anonymous mass of girls poured out, heartily waiting and then hiking into the night.
We gathered at the bottom of a valley, all clutching a small wax candle, similar to one you might light in a cathedral. The flame bestowed on us by Andrei Popov, the gathered to watch a girl wearing white sing, she sang and we looked at the crowd bathed in a soft balmy light. Eventually she made her way down to a beach, now exposed by our shared light, the fragile image shattered by Andrei and assorted teenage helpers gathering a canoe which the singing figure occupied a huge flame billowed and as she sang she disappeared the soft light of the Flames eclipsed by the far away beams of passing cars. Expectation peaked. What was next? Andrei Popov explained the piece in Russian, we were in the shadow of the second church in Russia. We walked back to the car, everyone looked around, we were joined by Yuri's friend, who we were introduced to as the choreographer, Yuri urged us to be quiet as his children were sleeping in the car. The woman's face was frantic, and her eyes wide.
We got back in the car after waiting, returning to the house we agreed to stay awake until the next instalment, due for 3am. We sat with Lena slumped on the table. We soon abandoned returning.
In the morning, a scene was set for 7am, we strolled around the town again, at midday making our way to the house. We set off again. This time gathering at a corn field and gathering an adolescent couple as hitchhikers. Many photographers documented every moment. We stole through the corn. Directed by Yuri we sat on the sharp ends of sythed corn, loud electronic music started. Women in the image of soviet realist paintings started flailing and then gathered corn. We watched. Photographers snapped.
Getting back in the car, we wobbled through fields, chased other cars, observed sets falling off vans, one of the hitchhikers started groping his teenage girlfriend. She pushed his hand away firmly.
We rode along the large empty roads as the stark landscaped peeled out in front of us, a black Nissan pulled up next to us, Yuri, many women in the back seat, including the choreographer. He blasting out rap and nodding along, we mimed shooting each other as he sped ahead blindly overtaking the two vans in front. Suddenly everyone was gone.
We stalked through small villages trying to trace Andrei Popov and his hotchpotch crew. We wobbled up and down fields, the scrape of the ground against the chassis of the car, we made our way down to the river, a local swimming spot on the opposite side. A call to Yuri, his 4x4 kicking up dirt as it overtook us again making our way to the wrong place. When we found where everyone had stripped down to underwear or swimming costumes and were standing nonchalantly around waiting. Eventually, almost without instruction, and after throwing all our possessions into the back of the car we lurched down a sandbank into the brown river surging by next to us.
Forty or fifty people including the family we were staying with and all the actors trod water, waiting. The water a relief from the temperatures which would later cause some heat stroke. Some splashed each other, others began gently paddling. Loosened from possession and identity, we became a mass. A long way from home I thought, deep in an alien country but levelled with creativity and curiosity. The current surged and many just floated, people with red hats, people calm, people religious, people flirting and splashing. The sons of the the family we stayed with asserting their macho template while Andrei Popov surveyed. Behind us four actors sang, their muscovite hair cuts the only thing separating them from the generations who had also swum here. As we drifted the women we were staying with also started singing, a surreal bi focal soundtrack. As we approached the bank Andrei Popov knelt in the water greeting the audience members as we left.
On the shore, Sasha and Yuri were gone. Lying on the sharp ground shoots of corn dug into my back. Later boards of wood were pulled out and the benches formed a platform for fruit which Sasha calmly played providing a needed injection of energy and spontaneity to a lagging non event.
This was accompanied by a indulgent performance: groups of couples spiralled, swirled, shoaled and mirrored clad in white. A descenting man in blue shorts expressed his personality through throwing grass in the faces of his companions.
As Sasha played a woman began pawing the ground, he limbs becoming raw against the sharp earth. We tried to talk to her and then she walked off into the middle of the bare scorched field. I have Yuri some water to give to her, he response unexpectantly blissful. She wasn't identified and it was clear where she came from or went.
We clambered back into the car this time joined by two performers. Neither students. One without pants and one in a footwell. We stopped for a drink at a small shop disguised as a house. The shop filled with drinks and a bottle of coke only cost 43p.
Back to the house. Emptier. Children playing with kittens. Alcohol and drugs forbidden. Smoking weed out the front. Rows of chairs in a field. A fire. This was when Sasha made his balloons. Helped by a Portuguese anarchist who smelled strongly of stale sweat and sculler around after us for the next portion of the evening with a disregard for the performance.
More people gathered, Andrei entertained glamorous men and glamorous wives who had arrived in sports cars. Holding court. More people trickled in, a note of exasperation, we formed a chain to pile bricks on the back of a truck. We travelled again to field. This time we were greeted by a naked boy smeared in clay.
The boy was a gate keeper to Yuri's performance we trapped across the field. Many more people wearing only clay. Their nudity nothing, the art primarily and sharply coming into focus as we wrapped ribbons around their necks, Yuri stood in the centre directing.
A PA system assembled. Sasha wanted to return to the house to finish balloons, the sun began to set. The roads had a different identity in the dark, we saw local people gathering on the side of the road with vodka and firecrackers. Shouting after the cars, too fancy, too disruptive. Couples met next to the town hall, in a town with one shop. Teenagers with boxer braids. Blonde Boys with angry looks in their eyes. We got back to the house, picked up the Portuguese anarchist and the helium and made our way back, our route obscured. As we arrived back the performance had finished and the group around it melted back towards the cars. More milling ensued. We ate some crisps. We waited for a while on the bridge with some of the performers considering whether to drive 30km to another stop. We decided to have dinner. Portuguese anarchist still in tow, along with other stragglers who thought we knew where we were going. We went to a Bavarian style chalet, out of place on a b-road deep in the mass of Russian countryside. Two people were outside smoking. Going inside it was completely empty aside from a granny mannequin sitting next to a computer playing the worse kind of euro techno.
We sat, a mild tension passed over the conversation, should we eat or seek out more performance which wasn't made for us or even for anyone to see. In search of meaning. A spectacle to bring people together. To be seen. After eating a pot of meat and potatoes smothered in dill and mayo. We returned to the river to help to assemble clay ovens in the pitch black, then choosing to return home instead of smoking with Yuri and co at the commune. We stole past a bonfire on our way back to bed as Babushka's flew through the air.
Waking up in the morning Yuri had prepared a meeting with a local Buisness man and Andrei Popov. We ate with the family, who showed us their extensive ceramic creations and then we went to the town to eat. We left after meeting a sausage magnate, seeing Yuri and talking about Rasputin. We set off for Vladimir, a town close. It was so hot we shelter in a bank for air conditioning. Having lunch in a gold lined restaurant Moscow beckoned.
The journey back to Moscow was just as long, this time quiet. Rain started. It continued and came down in sheets over cars in the traffic jam. We watched the lighting join the thunder in the sky. Sasha recorded the sound on a small recorder.
Returning to Moscow. We went to a hostel for a night, seeing English people for the first time in days. In Moscow for a moment. We went to rooftop pizza place and enjoyed a fresh balmy breeze, a view of the city and the smell of wet concrete. An early night. An early morning. We walked in the heat to the air bnb, via an 'English breakfast' of spliced frankfurter, arriving at the air bnb and being shown round by a Babushka wearing grey. Ill-shapen rooms. A wooden giraffe. A piano. Trinkets. A fully-stocked bathroom. A fully-stocked store cupboard. Placards with pictures of children. The entrance smelt like smoking covered with air conditioner and dried on carpet cleaner. The babushka left us and we relaxed walking over to Gorky Park; filled with teenagers, skaters, promotional kiosks for 'Vans' and 'Lays', clay being made, other ceramics. A debate about the use of skateboarding.
Dan joined us early in the morning. He was locked out. An alarm I set for 7am jolted me up and I nudged his sleeping presence up from outside the front door. We walked with Dan through Gorky Park, stopped for a drink. Enjoying the relaxing sunshine, looked at the Garage, discussed his contract and work commitments. After three beers we offered him a job. The next day we met Sasha, he took us to a boat, Andre and Yuri were there and we are cheap Greek food meeting an actor who had performed one-man versions of successful films. Friends with Yuri. Sasha and Yura arranged for us to meet Tatyana the events manager of an imposing modernist building. We dashed through the german expressionist, austere renderings of Lenin and Stalin and emerged at a bankers summer party.
The next day met Yuri at Stanislavski's house, emerging from the uber we saw Nina, an actor who works with Le Cirque, she took us into the suburban Moscow house, we almost had enough (200 roubles each). Assorted props everywhere and a large security guard instructed us to wear blue overshoes. Up the stairs we saw Stanislavski's parlour, where premiers of Tchaikovsky opera's were performed, a small room with a large leather chair, and a small stage dominated by columns. We visited his study, a handle that students touched for good luck, pictures of Chekhov. Yuri's friend, the choreographer, joined us, Yuri appeared kissing the walls of the house, dashing into the parlour and posing with Stanislavsky.
We started walking to another theatre which was closed. We walked through Red Square, I suggested going for coffee, Yuri told me the story of the Kremlin and him and Sasha's meeting. We dawdled outside a traditional looking restaurant complete with hanging baskets, Yuri had briefly mentioned previously that Ukrainian vodka was his favourite. He took us inside and women in traditional dress sat us outside (slightly outside the range of the wifi). We sat, conversation became stilted, best when deflected into Yuri's hands, he told us about his early years in Italy and pointed out our proximity to the Kremlin and Putin's office, and the irony of a Ukrainian restaurant within spitting distance. We struggled with the menu, he recommended 'dim sum' style dumplings, the rest of the menu looked inedible, when the waitress came he seemed to disregard our order and he spoke to her at length. Quite quickly six bottles of Vodka appeared, along with a warm drink of distilled bread, sweet and brown. Then lots of fish and bread and dumplings. We drank the vodka to a series of toasts all intertwined with bites of food. Conversation became more animated, stretched at its limits. The choreographer went to sit elsewhere (in the wifi), she was dancing that evening. The vodka not chemically but smooth and sweet. We walked for a long time after this, the sun beating down on us, we walked past a memorial of flowers for the leader of opposition to Putin who had been killed by the president of Chechnya, We talked about comparisons with Northern Island. The sun hot in the sky, the roads wide. Darting in between torn up roads, maintained by workers in bucket hats.
We found our way to Strelka (the design and architecture foundation, who were tearing up the roads), we sat in the air conditioned lounge in a stupor, quietly on our phones drinking fizzy water. Quickly returned to the flat. Then back to Strelka where now acerbic swedish architect was conducting a talk in a lilting americanised accent. Strelka, late, to eat, we sit again downstairs in the air conditioning, awkward again. Yuri disappeared, he comes down grinning, we are sat upstairs, a beautiful view of a sunset. I speak to Elena from the GRAD gallery about Suzdal, Moscow and everything in between.
The sun set slowly in the sky, casting a purple haze over proceedings and the awkward date next to us. I have a long conversation with Alex who has joined us from London about his simple life philosophy. Caesar Salads were eaten. We talked briefly about the project, it has become six towering freight containers. Yuri makes a speech celebrating their desire to find partners from the west, to begin of something. I meet a girl from Kazakstan, she laughs as I tell her about Suzdal and tells me it is in the Russian character to do everything at the last minute.
We leave. Everyone is drunk. Sasha misses his uber. We stumble around. He had never called an uber. We have a day inside doing nothing, preparing slides for our lecture that evening.
In the evening we make our way to Stelka again in a cab that goes the wrong way. We wait for a bit and then make our way upstairs. We are in a large loft, overlooking the cathedral and the Kremlin. A tall blonde woman is taking photographs with a disinterested air. A thin man with a bright white tee shirt and dyed blonde hair greets us warmly. We sit down, another woman is setting up some decks. We sit for a while and then we look at the view through the drizzle. Sasha is here. We sit until 8 O’Clock. No one has arrived. We mentally prepare ourselves. We are ushered into a back room, on the side there are bottles of whisky from a sponsor. We sit down on camping chairs in a circle and the conversation proceeds largely in English. Yuri enters with a man called Sasha, who is wearing a bright white adidas tracksuit, each of us get up and greet him with a fleeting full bodied handshake; conversation about time, space and Jungian philosophy. We drink the whisky and listen as he tells us about a performance of a Pushkin Opera which he made for a rich group of people with 3D mapping. We are then ushered back into the rooftop space and this time it is filled with people; young muscovite types who work in branding, marketing and account management for alcohol brands.
We bumble into our presentation, with a lot of faff to broadcast it to an expectant mass online. Showing pictures of our productions and speaking in the staccato english which we have adapted for our russian audience. They look on. We abruptly sit down and take some questions. There appeared to be a genuine interest from many, even those that didn’t understand us our bizarre inflections. Yuri speaks about the piece 'Palace of Youth' that the Russians made in London. We stick around after the party as Sasha’s girlfriend Aglaya was Djing.
People started going onto the terrace, to see the view, the rain continues. Stealing indoors through the busy kitchen back to the main space. A black woman sits on a bench waiting. People emerge out of backrooms. We decide to go, Yuri introduces me to two girls from St. Petersburg. We left.
We tried to call an uber; chasing it's ghost around the building without no wifi. We go to Strelka for another drink. We sat and talked over several pints. Sasha and Aglaya joined us for mackeral croquettes. We left. We wandered around this island in the middle of the large river. We stumbled into a club; a grotesque version of an american bar called 'Rolling Stone'. Filled with people.
We left. We cued, met some people from Cyprus. Lost Dan. Found Dan. Went to a club called Gipsy. Lost Dan. Danced. Found Dan outside absorbed with some older men in suits on a terrace. We walked out. A woman fell flat on her face. We got in a taxi. It cost £18.
We didn’t do anything the next day.
Despite saying to Misha we would go cycling.
We woke up. We headed to a market on the outskirts of Moscow. We ended up in what looked like an unused location for Clockwork Orange. We are stuck outside a hotel, venturing in to ask for a market. Gold. Lavish carpets. Porters with no teeth. They had no idea where the market was. We wandered towards an onion domed building. Not like the ones we had seen in Moscow, some cracked and broken, stylistically clashing with it's self. Crossing a draw bridge we entered a courtyard which felt like a forgotten theme park. One of the turrets was pumping out bass music, there was no one else in sight. We went up the stairs to be met by women who in chorus chimed ‘Good Morning’ when they heard our alien voices. We span round and went back down the steps.
We walked further into the square, which looked like the child catchers lair, visiting a ceramics shops and learning about milk glaze. Expressing some feigned interest in a fledgling buisness, nothing else was open. Further in eight stalls unfurling, collections of ephemera including Lenin figurines, nuts, bolts, paintings, assorted Russian dolls, further in stalls started to set up. The further we ventured, across wooden gantries ending in soviet era pistols, down stone steps adorned with furry hats, through boulevards of saccharine paintings, we walked for half an hour and on each side we'd wade through silk dresses and wooden toys, fridge magnets of Putin. There seemed to be more traders than tourists. A man sat hunched over a stall arranging a group of 12 bolts. A stall with machine guns hanging from chains. Josh bought a chess set. Dan a hat. I bought a small paint-it-yourself Russian doll. We eat ribs then play chess. Then decide to dare ourselves to find the source of the still booming music.
Out from a toilet emerged two large women, their chests covered in tattoos, the returned to a room which only contained a dj and one enthusiastic dancer, a man lying on a sofa in a suit. We retreated down the stairs, not quite as fast as before. We return to the ballardian GREAT WESTERN HOTEL and Misha bounded in on a folding bicycle. After some kerfuffle about an uber, we made for a park full of pavilions dedicated to Russian industry: agriculture, textiles, sheep, and places like Ukraine and Belarus. It also houses the science museum and many empty buildings.
We make for the cycle hire, Dan quaking in his boots, (it would later transpire that his last excursion on a bike had ended in a broken wrist and 15 years of cycle phobia.)
Dan valiantly got on the bike. He made it down a straight path, turned with his feet and back again, we all dashed into the park. Past a rocket. Past gold sculptures of workers and grain. Dilapidated buildings. We rode down the lake as it started raining. Misha passing us horseradish vodka he had made. We went to a Japanese garden, it cost 200 roubles. We walked around it and into a pagoda. The rain intensified and we raced through the park, to get to a georgian restaurant, past a cavernous glass space and the closed botanical garden. Soaked we reached a Georgian restaurant. Misha took charge of ordering and soon, we dried off and ate dough parcels of meat and soup, and bread with egg or cheese integrated into it’s structure. We dashed home. Very tired. Cancelled a drinks plan and prepared for our final day. Dan left at 1am. We have a last breakfast with the russians and are rushed to the train tation by Yuri fresh from a 72 hour rave.