When the Swan Sings (Part 1)
When the Swan Sings (Part 1)
2026
Saint Petersburg, Russia
When the Swan Sings is a dance film dedicated to all bodies that have lost their home — through violence, displacement, or the slow erosion of the environments they once belonged to.
At the centre of the film is a migratory swan embodied by a dancer. Its journey unfolds across fragile natural landscapes — water, wind, open horizons — evoking a world in which life once moved in balance. These spaces hold the memory of belonging, of breath, of continuity.
Gradually, this world begins to shift. Water darkens, air thickens, and the ground becomes unstable. The swan continues to move, but each gesture carries resistance. The choreography transforms: breath becomes strained, movement fractures, and the body absorbs the tension of a changing environment.
The swan, traditionally a symbol of beauty and purity, is reimagined as a body marked by experience. Its transformation from white to black does not signify evil, but the accumulation of memory — a visible trace of time, trauma, and survival. The body becomes a surface where ecological and political realities are inscribed.
The film unfolds through a dialogue between choreography and cinematic language. Wind, sound, and material textures become active forces, shaping the movement and the perception of space. The camera does not simply document the body but enters into a relationship with it, creating a shifting field between presence and image.
This work is an offering — to those who continue to move despite instability, to those who have been forced to leave, and to those who remain within environments that no longer sustain life. It gives form to what often cannot be spoken: grief for lost places, memory of what once held us, and the quiet persistence of life within collapse.
