"DANCE THEATRE WITH TEETH: VIDEO, ELECTRONICS, ESTATES"

Contemporary dance, live electronic music, and video scenography collide in a performance of urban resilience. 

Inspired by the private diaries and interviews of Oscar-winning director Andrzej Wajda, BLOKOWISKO revives a lost cinematic vision as an intense encounter between dance, live electronic music and three-screen video. At its centre lies Igor's Tale – a true account Wajda heard from an actor in 1972, shaped into a screenplay and then abandoned twice before it could reach the screen. BLOKOWISKO gives this story a body and a voice for the first time  – honouring the vision Wajda never had the chance to realise.

BLOKOWISKO transforms this fragile human story into a living performance. It shows how a fleeting encounter can leave indelible traces, shaping both personal memory and collective experience.

Created and directed by composer-performer Blanka Barbara Stahl, and developed with creative strategist Ignatius Sokal and choreographer Anthony Matsena, BLOKOWISKO follows people in the grey pulse of a city built on routine and quiet oppression.

Story: "Two people meet in a city built for forgetting. For one night, the world opens into colour and possibility. By morning, he cannot find his way back through the labyrinth of identical buildings — and what haunts him is not only the loss, but the fear that she may believe he chose to leave."

World Premiere of BLOKOWISKO took place at the Southbank Centre in London, UK, on 20 March 2026.

Duration: 75 minutes (without interval)

Format: Full-length stage work for 8 dancers, live electronic music, and video scenography

CREDITS:

Concept and music: Blanka Barbara Stahl
Choreography: Anthony Matsena

Artistic Direction: Blanka Barbara Stahl, Anthony Matsena and Ignatius Sokal
Video design: -8
Lighting design: Philip Burke
Costume and stage design: Ismini Papaioannou

Dancers: Harvey Burke-Hamilton, Harrison Claxton, Julia Costa, Sama Daw, Orla Hardie, Folu Odimayo, Tommi Sutton and Holly Vallis

Patronage: Krystyna and Daniel Olbrychski, Manggha Museum of Japanese Art and Technology, Kinoteka Polish Film Festival, Polish Cultural Institute in London

Special thanks to: Joshua Attwood, Dan Baines, Kel Matsena, Joanna Parker, Universitas Society of Authors and Publishers, Studio 17, Excelsior Studios, Studio Wayne McGregor, The Boury Academy Studios

Photography: Jimmy Parratt, Kirsten McTernan

Premiere filmed by: Urban Rec