Monoplay and dancEUA: Bringing the Zadar and Ukrainian Dance Scenes Together

The end of August - from 19th until 22nd - is once again reserved for Monoplay, a dance festival dedicated to the solo performance format, which has been taking place in Zadar since 2009. What was once a small festival has long since grown into an important meeting point for dance professionals, critics, educators and emerging generations of dancers. Together with the audience, they use the festival as a space to open up new questions, exchange ideas and spark conversations that contribute not only to their own artistic development, but to the wider dance scene as well.

This year, the Zadar dance community will join forces with dancEUA, a project dedicated to strengthening Ukraine’s contemporary dance scene through artistic residencies, education, the creation of new works, international exchange and touring opportunities. As part of the festival programme, six dancEUA participants – Daria Cristea, Julia Tytska, Lea Amneby Snickars, Nikita Sulko, Valeria Churai and Valeria Lysenkovska – will present their work on Friday 21st of August, bringing a diverse range of perspectives, themes and approaches to contemporary dance to the stage.

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Daria Cristea, Julia Tytska, Valeria Lysenkovska, Valeria Churai, Nikita Sulko, Lea Amneby Snickars

Six solo performances, six different perspectives

The programme opens with Daria Cristea (RO) and her performance Am I in Control?, which explores the relationship between the body, a skateboard and a mobile phone, and the question of control in a world where technology constantly competes for our attention. The skateboard becomes a symbol of the unstable ground between the physical and digital worlds: while the body struggles to maintain its balance, the phone constantly redirects attention, creating tension between movement and distraction, autonomy and dependence. The solo explores the illusion of control and the fragile relationship between freedom and technological influence, ultimately asking a simple yet essential question: are we really in control, or are we merely adapting to systems that control us?

Julia Tytska (UA) presents Run On, a work centred on running and the inevitable confrontation with our own actions. You can run as far as you want, but sooner or later, the darkness will bring everything to light. The performance reflects on the inevitability of facing what we have done – and the price we eventually have to pay for our actions.

In DORA, Lea Amneby Snickars (SE) explores the relationship between movement and spoken language, questioning how identity and authenticity are shaped in front of an audience. Originally a 20-minute work, DORA has been reworked into a shorter version especially for the Monoplay festival. Moving through different narratives and choreographic propositions, the solo plays with the audience’s perception of fiction, reality and performance, asking what it really means to be authentic on stage.

In Beauty Around Us, Together by Nikita Sulko (UA) invites us to pause and look at the world around us. Through ideas of togetherness, presence and unconditional love for everything that surrounds us, the performance reflects on the beauty we share with others – the possibility of being here and now, seeing the world together and sharing that love with a kindred spirit.

In Countless, Valeria Churai (UA) explores life and time through the lens of absence. Life unfolds as though it has no end, while time remains invisible until its shape reveals what is no longer there. Countless opens up a space for reflection on transience and the paradox of infinity – perhaps nothing is more infinite than that which is already slipping away.

The programme concludes with The Cold Settles In by Valeria Lysenkovska (UA), a work that connects inner coldness with exhaustion and emptiness. Troubled thoughts bring inner warmth to complete burnout, while a dense coldness settles into the void. Yet as it gradually retreats, it leaves something unexpected behind: a state of pure calm.

Six artists, six solo performances and six different perspectives become part of Monoplay’s space for encounter, exchange and dialogue. Through encounters like these, the festival has been connecting local and international dance communities for years, creating space for new artists and ideas. It is also a reminder that contemporary dance, even when performed as a solo, is never simply a conversation between one body and itself – it is a dialogue with the audience, the space and the world around it.