Beyond Sin
a ballet by Boris Eifman based on The Brothers Karamazov novel by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
music: Richard Wagner, Modest Mussorgsky, Sergei Rachmaninoff
Duration
2 hours
12+
for viewers over 12 years old
Premiere: April 29, 2013
“The Brothers Karamazov novel was the epitome of Dostoevsky’s creative development, the acme of the philosophic investigation carried out by this colossal and restless mind throughout his life. For the last two decades, observing the march of the contemporary history of our country, I have kept getting convinced again and again of the all-time relevance of this work of literature regarded as the spiritual will and testament of the great writer.
Expanding the potential of body language as a way of exploring the inner world of man, we offer our vision of the key ideas of the novel. Beyond Sin both carries on and develops the tradition of the psychological ballet art and strives to accomplish another equally complicated task — to create a choreographic art equivalent to the subject so masterfully investigated by Dostoevsky — that of the racking burden of destructive passions and of bad heredity.
“The Beyond Sin ballet is an attempt to study the origins of the moral catastrophe of the Karamazovs, to understand the primal essence of the “excessively broad” human nature, the mystery of the inner life of human hearts and souls where “God and Devil are fighting”. Having, on principle, rejected the idea of putting on stage all story lines of the novel, I focused on the process of creating choreographic insights into the souls of the main characters beset with internal conflicts.
In The Brothers Karamazov there is expressed a pivotal idea: if there is no God then “all things are lawful”. Our modern times could be comprehensively described with a different expression: “God exists, and yet all things are lawful”. For this very reason time is now ripe to rethink the issues and problems which haunted Fyodor Dostoevsky and his heroes. A search for the ways to the happiness of mankind, the price to be paid for such a harmony, the power of vice and sin over man, the nature of true faith — one who seriously ponders over these topics simply cannot cherish hopes for attaining absolute truth. But touching upon them we are step by step moving toward a better understanding of ourselves in this imperfect and ever-changing world".
Boris Eifman
“The Brothers Karamazov novel was the epitome of Dostoevsky’s creative development, the acme of the philosophic investigation carried out by this colossal and restless mind throughout his life. For the last two decades, observing the march of the contemporary history of our country, I have kept getting convinced again and again of the all-time relevance of this work of literature regarded as the spiritual will and testament of the great writer.
Expanding the potential of body language as a way of exploring the inner world of man, we offer our vision of the key ideas of the novel. Beyond Sin both carries on and develops the tradition of the psychological ballet art and strives to accomplish another equally complicated task — to create a choreographic art equivalent to the subject so masterfully investigated by Dostoevsky — that of the racking burden of destructive passions and of bad heredity.
“The Beyond Sin ballet is an attempt to study the origins of the moral catastrophe of the Karamazovs, to understand the primal essence of the “excessively broad” human nature, the mystery of the inner life of human hearts and souls where “God and Devil are fighting”. Having, on principle, rejected the idea of putting on stage all story lines of the novel, I focused on the process of creating choreographic insights into the souls of the main characters beset with internal conflicts.
In The Brothers Karamazov there is expressed a pivotal idea: if there is no God then “all things are lawful”. Our modern times could be comprehensively described with a different expression: “God exists, and yet all things are lawful”. For this very reason time is now ripe to rethink the issues and problems which haunted Fyodor Dostoevsky and his heroes. A search for the ways to the happiness of mankind, the price to be paid for such a harmony, the power of vice and sin over man, the nature of true faith — one who seriously ponders over these topics simply cannot cherish hopes for attaining absolute truth. But touching upon them we are step by step moving toward a better understanding of ourselves in this imperfect and ever-changing world".
Boris Eifman
A ballet by Boris Eifman
Set and costumes: Vyacheslav Okunev
Set and costumes: Vyacheslav Okunev
