PERFORMING ARTS CALENDAR
October 10 – 19
Cassandra by Lesia Ukrainka
A Razom Co-Production
Directed by Artemis Wheelock
10 Performances at Teatro LATEA
Matinees 1pm, Evening performances 7pm
Ukrainian literary titan Lesia Ukrainka’s Cassandra makes its American premiere as part of the Ukrainian Cultural Festival: Against the Grain.
Cassandra presents an electrifying condemnation of authoritarianism and illuminates the ongoing fight for truth, situated in the context of Russian aggression. Written in 1907, Cassandra is a timeless piece that provides an opportunity to engage audiences in meaningful dialogue about truth and the consequences of war.
October 12
Vocal Workshop: Lyrical Songs with Kurbasy
Learn Ukrainian Lyrical songs with Kurbasy, the internationally renowned musical group from Lviv!
Workshop hosted by Ukrainian Village Voices
Teatro LATEA, 1-3pm
Kurbasy is a contemporary musical project of the renowned progressive Les Kurbas Theatre in Lviv, Ukraine. Led by actor-vocalists Mariia Oneshchak and Nataliia Rybka-Parkhomenko, Kurbasy’s performances trace a theatrical arc to reveal the stories held in the songs of their rich repertoire. The idea of culture as a cosmic living organism is central to Kurbasy, whose folk-based multimedia performances vibrate in tight vocal harmonies, resonant lyrics, distinctive instrumentation, and phantasmagoric visual imagery. Kurbasy’s sonic-theatrical explorations of Ukraine’s rich trove of calendar songs, lullabies, and legends, conjure the natural world, beliefs, and rituals, channeling contemporary connections to an archaic past.
October 13
Apocollapse!
Written by Dean Temple
Directed by Rory Pelsue
Staged Reading at Teatro LATEA, 7pm
Jerahmeel’s family is a mess. Her brother’s from Hell, her mom’s always pregnant, and her dad wants to end the world. Trouble is, he can. Apocollapse! is a satire – grown from Russia’s war on Ukraine – that skewers paternalism, disinformation, and the weaponizing of traditional values as an excuse to take whatever you want.
October 17 – 18
A Romantic from Kharkiv: music of Sergei Bortkiewicz
Partnership with Anna and Dmitri Shelest
Faust Harrison Pianos, 7:30pm
To mark a worldwide release of a new classical recording of music by a romantic Ukrainian composer, Sergei Bortkiewicz, Anna and Dmitri Shelest present a live piano recital with selected works from the record, remarks about Bortkiewicz’s life and music, followed by a wine and cheese reception.
October 21
Yara Arts: ZHADAN & FRIENDS 2025
Yara Arts Group presents: ZHADAN & FRIENDS 2025
new poetry by Serhiy Zhadan and translations (bilingual event)
Bowery Poetry Club, 7pm
Bob Holman, Wanda Phipps, Olena Jennings and over twenty other poets respond with their own work to bilingual readings of Serhiy Zhadan.
Plus, songwriter Susan Hwang sings her songs based on Zhadan’s poems.
October 28
Talks with the Besieged
Written by Alex Averbuch
Translated by Oksana Maksymchuk, Max Rosochinsky, and the author
Directed by Dmitri Barcomi
Staged Reading at Teatro LATEA, 7pm
What does it mean to find yourself in the in-between, as your land is slowly taken over? Drawn from real online conversations in Russian-occupied Eastern Ukraine, this play listens rather than explains, preserving the voices of confusion, resilience, and survival of those left behind and, too often, erased from the story of war.
November 1
Our Life Behind Barbed Wire
Musical-poetic performance with poet Alex Averbuch, translators Oksana Maksymchuk and Max Rosochinsky, and composer-vocalist Olga Zaitseva-Herz
Part of Shevchenko Workshop in Ukrainian Studies
A powerful exhibit and musico-poetic performance by Alex Averbuch and Olga Zaitseva-Herz, staged within the exhibit space itself. Surrounded by rare photographs of Ukrainian Ostarbeiters, audiences experience poetry, song, and storytelling that connect forced labor, the Holocaust, and
today’s war in Ukraine.
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