Wojciech Rybicki: SISTERS

Months earlier, Poles had witnessed the collapse of the communist regime, opening a new future with new desires, dances — and new Moscows. Perhaps these rapid socio-political changes caused the planned ballet to fade into oblivion. The sisters remained trapped in forgetfulness, waiting not only for Moscow but also for the promised premiere.

In 2019, three decades after the fall of communism, during a school theatre festival, Wojciech Rybicki staged his first work. His grandfather had to leave early due to illness. This left a suspension in the performance – and the grandfather never saw it to the end.

SISTERS is an attempt to restore not only a forgotten ballet premiere but also the unfinished premiere from 2019. This semi-documentary attempt of recovering dancing bodies simulates a ballet that never came into being, employing a grandchild’s longing. It is a story about intimacy, time and inheritance. A request to dancing ancestors to deliver a love letter to a grandfather who passed away in 2020 after a long battle with cancer.

It seeks traces of lost futures, setting in motion a poetic shift from that which haunts toward that which heals and liberates. It is an act of resistance against personal and institutional politics that use oblivion as a tool of censorship – erasing memories.