I Love Ballet, Ramona Nagabczyńska

After the 16.10 screening there will be a discussion with the creators of the show. Hosted by Julia Asperska.

After the 17.10 show, there will be a concert by Daniel Szweda.

The ticket from 16.10 allows you to enter the concert of Daniel Szweda 17.10.

The statement “I love ballet” is downright anecdotal in the dance community. Such a phrase often falls from the lips of ballet school students when they are asked why they decided to get a ballet education, and they feel the oppressive gaze of the ballet teacher on themselves.

Four dancers and independent dance artists who graduated from ballet school but abandoned ballet in favor of other dance forms are taking a fresh look at ballet. They notice what further attracts them in this discipline, what rejects them, what traces they see of their ballet education in their current body and life. Twenty years after the end of their adventure with ballet, Aleksandra Borys, Karolina Kraczkowska, Ramona Nagabczyńska and Iza Szostak reach the critical distance needed to perceive the “text” of the ballet. And as it turns out, this “text” is very rich. Both the explicit ballet librettos expressed and the narratives hidden behind the scenes can be endlessly analyzed as ideological machines.

Ramona Nagabczyńska in one of the talks about the performance notes: “The whole ballet system is permeated with patriarchy, it penetrates into every rift. At the very bottom, in the corps de ballet, all ballerinas are supposed to look the same and move the same, not as their body tells them to. The higher in the hierarchy, the fewer women there are, and the top belongs to men. There is a director, soloists and one prima ballerina, even though there are statistically far more women in ballet than men. It's a world built by men for men. About their fantasies.”

Choreography: Ramona Nagabczyńska

Dramaturgy: Agata Siniarska

Set design and costumes: Dominika Olszowy

Costume collaboration: Joanna Kotowicz

Music: Daniel Szwed

Lighting design: Piotr Pieczyński

Starring: Aleksandra Borys, Karolina Kraczkowska, Ramona Nagabczyńska, Iza Szostak

Release Date: 30 May 2025

Premiere co-financed by the Warsaw City Council within the framework of the Warsaw Commune — Social Institution of Culture project.

RAMONA NAGABCZYŃSKA — dancer and choreographer. She studied at the Ballet School in Warsaw, the Hochschule für Musik und Darstellende Kunst in Frankfurt, the London Contemporary Dance School in London and at the SWPS University and the University of Warsaw. Her choreographic works include: “New (Dis) Order” (2012) — selected in 2014 for the Aerowaves network, “Body parts” (2019) — also selected for the Aerowaves network, “Silenzio!” (2021) and, “Blissful” (2022). From 2015 to 2019 she was an artist of the international performing arts network apap Network. In 2021, she won an award for directing the play “Silenzio!” at the Divine Comedy Festival. She is one of the co-founders of the Centrum w Ruchu collective.

AGATA SINIARSKA — choreographer, performer, playwright, musician. She is engaged in extended choreography. Her current research focuses on the idea of the Anthropocene museum, multi-species archives in times of war and extinction, and the various alliances between human and non-human bodies. In 2025, she became a bronze medalist at the European Championships in Lisbon. He lives in Berlin.

ALEKSANDRA BORYS — choreographer. A graduate of the University of the Arts in London, Codarts in Rotterdam and the National Ballet School in Łódź. She works with choreography in art and science, including science, cosmology and ecology in artistic research.

KAROLINA KRACZKOWSKA — dancer, performer, choreographer. A graduate of the Institute of Applied Linguistics at the University of Warsaw and the Dance in Performance program at Laban Center in London. In his works, he often deepens his movement and choreographic practice, exploring the possibilities of transforming the body and changing his own identity.

IZA SZOSTAK — choreographer and performer. A graduate of the Ballet School in Warsaw and Codarts in Rotterdam. Her artistic path leads through classical dance, explorations of new materialism, to experiments with VR technology.