For the last decade, East of Culture Festival – Different Sounds has been showcasing the latest literature from Ukraine, Belarus, and the Baltic states. This year, the festival will continue this tradition with six book launches featuring authors like Aušra Kaziliūnaitė, Kristiina Ehin, Lena Kudaieva, Polina Pogonceva, Oksana Savchenko, Ilya Kaminsky, and Lamed Szapiro. The premieres will be accompanied by discussions about the books and the socio-cultural context in which they were written. Mark your calendars for July 6th to July 9th, 2023, as Lublin becomes the vibrant host city for the 16th edition of Different Sounds and its 10th iteration as part of the East of Culture project, a collaborative effort between the National Centre for Culture and three cities in eastern Poland: Lublin, Białystok, and Rzeszów. This remarkable endeavour is made possible with the generous support of the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage.
WSCHODNI EXPRESS | book launches, panels, discussions
6.07 | 17.00-18.00 | Through the Lens: Unveiling the Journey of the Ukrainian photo reporter Sofia Yablonska. Guests: Veronika Homeniuk and Natalie Oudin. Moderator: Dorota Mościbrodzka | Bałagan – patio, Grodzka 5a| PL / UKR / FRA
7.07 |17.00 -18.00 | Book launch: Aušra Kaziliūnaitė “osobista pustka”, translated from Lithuanian by Paulina Ciucka | Guests: Aušra Kaziliūnaitė, Paulina Ciucka. Moderator: Wojciech Szot | Bałagan – patio, Grodzka 5a | PL / LTU
7.07 |18.30 – 19.30 | Book launch: Lamed Shapiro “Wylej swój gniew”, translated from Yiddish by Bella Szwarcman-Czarnota. Guests: Bella Szwarcman-Czarnota, host: Magdalena Kicińska | Bałagan – patio, Grodzka 5a | PL
8.07 |10.00 -11.30 | Book Launch: Lena Kudaieva, Polina Pogonceva, Oskana Savchenko, ”Insekt”, translated from Ukrainian by Anna Korzeniowska-Bihun. Guests: Lena Kudaieva, Polina Pogonceva, Oskana Savchenko, Anna Korzeniowska-Bihun, moderator: Paweł Passini | Bałagan – patio, Grodzka 5a | PL / UKR
8.07 | 12.00-12.45| “Nightfall Shrouds the Morning Glow” – a performative reading accompanying the release of the book “Insekt” | Workshops of Culture, Grodzka 5a – auditorium, 2nd floor | UKR/ PL
8.07 | 14.00 -15.00 | “United for victory” – an auction for Ukraine | Bałagan – patio, Grodzka 5a | PL / UKR
8.07 | 16.00 – 17.30 | Book launch: Kristiina Ehin “Planeta pożeraczy serc”, translated from Estonian by Marta Perlikiewicz. Guest: Marta Perlikiewicz. Host: Olga Wiewióra | Bałagan – patio, Grodzka 5a | PL
9.07 | 11.00 – 12.00 | Book launch: Ilya Kaminsky “Deaf Republic”, Polish translation by: Anna Łazar. Guests: Ilya Kaminsky, Anna Łazar. Moderator: Bartosz Wójcik | Bałagan – patio, Grodzka 5a | POL / EN / Polish Sign Language
9.07 | 13.00 – 14.00 | Book launch of the monograph on Belarusian theatre. Guests: Irina Lappo, Hanna Karniajuk, Ewa Wientorska, Grzegorz Kondrasiuk | Bałagan – patio, Grodzka 5a | PL / BLR
East of Culture – Different Sounds
East of Culture – Different Sounds is most of all a music festival. The musical acts scheduled to perform at the event are: Ladytron – the legendary group from the British electronic scene, Stian Westerhus – a Norwegian guitar virtuoso, Nuha Ruby Ra – a rising star in the British contemporary music scene, To Rococo Rot – the legends of the German music scene blending electronic music with live sound, the Italian masters of poetic vibe Dead Cat in a Bag. You can also catch live shows by Whispering Sons with their unique blend of experimental and frenetic post-punk, the Estonian duo Bedless Bones, combining – among others – dark wave, industrial, and electro elements, the Canadian duo Miesha & The Spanks, bringing a powerful fusion of garage rock, grunge, and punk, and the German project Lucy Kruger & The Lost Boys, exploring genres such as psychedelic folk, ambient punk, and art pop. We will hear excellent Polish bands – Szorstkie, Tuleje, and Atol Atol Atol, Contemporary Noise Ensemble, who are making a big comeback, Jakub Skorupa, whose career is on fire, phenomenal young groups like ta Ukrainka and Kisu Min, as well as the jazz-blues band Koń. Our eastern neighbours will be represented by projects from the alternative scene: the jazz band Hyphen Dash and the electronic music artists The Lazy Jesus and Monoconda.
At this year’s edition, we will also see the photographic journeys of Sofia Yablonska – a pioneering Ukrainian photographer, feminist, and photojournalist, alongside the striking poster art by Dominika Czerniak-Chojnacka, the mesmerising glass plate negatives by Leopoldyna and Edward Janusz, and a fascinating showcase of book covers from Wschodni Express.
One of the major obstacles in developing intercultural cooperation and overcoming stereotypes about the cultures of Central and Eastern European countries is the language barrier. While it may not be a significant issue in other fields of cultural practice (music, visual arts), it can hinder reception of literature and broadly defined exchange of ideas. In this context, it is vital to ensure a good flow of the current thought, writing and literature translated into national languages. The “Wschodni Express” series, established at Workshops of Culture, fulfills this function by introducing the most current prose and poetry from Eastern Partnership countries to Poland. For the past 10 years, the series has had its inauguration during East of Culture Festival – Different Sounds.
Book launches 2023
1. Aušra Kaziliūnaitė |”osobista pustka” | translator: Paulina Ciucka
“osobista pustka” is the first Polish translation of a Lithuanian poet of the younger generation.
This collection presents poems from the last three volumes by Lithuanian poet Aušra Kaziliūnaitė, with the aim of providing Polish readers with a coherent compilation of her work that is connected by themes, motifs, and poetic devices. Unlike her earlier poems, the author moves away from experimenting with form and instead focuses on constructing her imaginative world. This world includes a realm born from a blue egg, seemingly existing bodies of water, and the “truer” versions of ourselves on the other side of the mirror. Kaziliūnaitė’s fantastic collage incorporates fragments of other people’s work, shards of philosophical theories, and fragments of the real world. Paulina Ciucka (translator).
Aušra Kaziliūnaitė (born in 1987 in Vilnius) is a poet, philosopher, and writer. She studied history and religious studies. In 2020, she defended her doctoral thesis at the Faculty of Philosophy at Vilnius University. Since 2019, she has been serving as the vice president of the Writers’ Union of Lithuania. She has published five poetry collections: “Pirmoji lietuviška knyga” (The First Lithuanian Book, 2007), “20% koncentracijos stovykla” (A Half-Whistle Concentration Camp, 2009), “Mėnulis yra tabletė” (The Moon Is a Tablet, 2014), “esu aptrupėjusios sienos” (I Am Shattered Walls, 2016), and “Jūros nėra” (There Is No Sea, 2021). Her works have been awarded the prestigious Jurgis Ivanovasukaitė Prize, the Ministry of Culture of Lithuania’s Prize for Young Creators, and the Elena Mezginaitė Prize.
2. Kristiina Ehin | “Planeta pożeraczy serc” | translator: Marta Perlikiewicz
Kristiina Ehin’s prose is characterised by imaginative storytelling and a profound insight into reality. Her allegorical images allow for descriptions of emotions that may escape the reader in a realistic narrative. The Estonian writer depicts patterns that shape our behavior, guiding our lives and relationships. Her characters strive to find true love. Some suffer at the hands of fate but never cease their search, while others discover a treasure and face the question of how to maintain their newfound happiness. Ehin’s stories are full of allegories, written with a sense of peculiar absurdity and surrealism, much like fairy tales where every other sentence may surprise us with unexpected twists.
Kristiina Ehin, born in 1977 in Rapla, is an Estonian poet and short story writer. She studied Estonian and comparative folk poetry at the University of Tartu. In her native language, she has so far published ten volumes of poetry, three collections of short stories, modern retellings of folk tales from southern Estonia, and a volume of autobiographical reflections. She is also the author of two theatre plays and poetic audio dramas. Ehin’s works combine everyday life with mythological elements. She received the most prestigious Estonian poetry award for her collection “Kaitseala” (Huma, 2005), which includes poems and journal entries she wrote while working as a nature reserve guard on an uninhabited island off the northern coast of Estonia. Her recent books in Estonian have been all bestsellers from 2019 to 2023.
3. Lena Kudaieva, Polina Pogonceva, Oskana Savchenko | “Insekt” | translator: Anna Korzeniowska-Bihun
“Insekt” is the result of collaboration between three cultural institutions: the Ukrainian Institute, Zbigniew Raszewski Theatre Institute, and Workshops of Culture in Lublin. The volume consists of three dramas selected in 2022 as part of the “transmission.UA: drama on the move” programme run by the Ukrainian Institute. The programme aims to promote contemporary Ukrainian drama in European countries. This bilingual publication, in Polish and Ukrainian, marks the beginning of drama publications within Wschodni Express, a series published by Workshops of Culture since 2024. Zbigniew Raszewski Theatre Institute is a co-publisher of the collection.
Ukrainian literature, including drama, will never be the same as it used to be. The experience of a long-lasting war with its various phases has undoubtedly had a profound impact on Ukrainian writers. Playwrights have learned to recognise and neutralise human traumas, acquiring the rare ability to separate what truly matters from trivial and unreal topics. They have restored proper proportions to the matters at hand. Combined with significant universal themes, this will undoubtedly result in powerful dramatic literature. Anna Korzeniowska-Bihun (translator)
Lena Kudaieva was born in 1977 in Donetsk. She lived quietly in independent Ukraine until war with Russia began in 2014. After moving a lot, she eventually settled in Kramatorsk and embarked on a new life. In 2020, she received a master’s degree in psychology. In February 2021, she attended an intensive documentary theatre course in February 2021 and wrote her first dramatic text 6,5, a production of which premiered on September 4, 2021 at the Kulish Regional Academic Music and Drama Theatre in Kherson. She was selected for the DRAMLABNEO Week drama laboratory supported by the Ukrainian Cultural Foundation. Participation in the project resulted in her first creative dramatic text, Diary of an Excellent Student, which was long listed at the 7th Drama.UA Play Contest in 2021. In October 2022, two of her plays (Insect and One Day) were shortlisted for the July Honey Festival of Contemporary Ukrainian Drama. In November 2022, One Day and Bad Year were shortlisted at the 13th Contemporary Play Week drama competition.
Oksana Savchenko (b.1975 in Kyiv). She is a screenwriter, playwright, and journalist. As a screenwriter, she has worked with television channels TRK Ukraine, Inter, and with the FILM.UA media company. She participated at the Heidelberger Stückemarkt Theater Festival (2017) in Germany, the international Telpa Daugavpils festival in Latvia (2014), and the Contemporary Play Week in Kyiv. She has collaborated with Georg Genoux and Natalka Vorozhbyt’s Theater of Displaced People. In 2011, she participated in the London Royal Court theatre program for Ukrainian playwrights.
Polina Pogonceva (b. 1986 in Zaporizhzhia ) is a Ukrainian playwright. She has lived in Kyiv, Dnipro and Zaporizhzhia. Her plays have been presented at Kyiv theaters, including Roof and PostPlay, as well as in the New Drama Theatre in Zaporizhzhia. Her plays are available online on a website for Ukrainian dramatists, UkrDramaHub. Her plays include: Someone’s Blood, Don’t Be Crazy, which premiered at the Wild Theatre in January 2022, and Grandma and Grandpa Have Sex, which premiered at the Theatre of Playwrights in Kyiv in May 2022. Her play Save the Light premiered in July 2022 at Baron’s Court Theatre in the UK.
ZAKOTWICZONE series
This publication series (lit. anchored) was established at Workshops of Culture in 2021 in response to new needs arising from the era of disintegration of community, European, neighborly, and interpersonal bonds and the collapse of previous geopolitical arrangements. The concept of geopoetics has also evolved and literature that transcends boundaries can go further, unify and explain the current transformations in the world. It can challenge established thought patterns, recognise emotional reactions, seek deeper understanding of concepts, confront the challenges of the present and future without disregarding the sources from which it emerged, and anchor itself to a single nerve of time, place, or value system. However, in the new post-isolation world marked by catastrophe, a new sensitivity is born. The notions of what is ours, native, and familiar have burned out. The borders between the West and the East, the North and the South, are once again shifting, along with the literatures of individual countries and languages. It is time to change the narrative based on convenient oppositions and divisions. We have to embrace variability and inevitable change to unleash new cultural meanings. To connect and flow. To anchor once again.
BOOK LAUNCHES:
1. Ilya Kaminsky | “Deaf Republic” | translator: Anna Łazar
Ilya Kaminsky is a Ukrainian-Russian-Jewish-American poet, critic, translator, and professor at Princeton University. He is best known for his poetry collections “Dancing in Odessa” and “Deaf Republic,” which blur the boundaries between poetry and drama. His works have been translated into over 20 languages and will be published in Polish for the first time. He has received major literary awards in the United States. Kaminsky was born in 1977 into a Jewish family in Odessa, in the former Ukrainian SSR.
He lost hearing when he was 4. When he was 16 years old, his family obtained asylum in the United States. It was there that he was fitted with a hearing aid for the first time. His works introduce readers to a world full of evocative sounds, a unique rhythm; he also touches on current civic and political issues. At the same time, he skilfully plays with language and genre, interweaving profound themes with moments of lightness, humour, and eroticism. “Deaf Republic” is an incredibly powerful narrative about the current state of the world, touching on themes of war, deafness, and the challenges of humanity.
2. Lamed Shapiro | “Wylej swój gniew” | translator: Bella Szwarcman-Czarnota
Pour Out Thy Wrath is a compilation of short stories that have been translated from Yiddish by Bella Szwarcman-Czarnota. The author, Lamed Shapiro, was a Jewish writer who was previously unknown in Poland. He was originally from Ukraine and began his literary career in Warsaw. Later, he moved to New York and Los Angeles, where he spent the rest of his life. The collection of his short stories is being published in Poland for the first time. Shapiro’s stories cover difficult topics such as Jewish pogroms and relationships with neighbours, as well as universal themes like love and loneliness, particularly in the context of relationships between men and women.
OUTSIDE THE SERIES
1. SKETCHES ON CONTEMPORARY BELARUSIAN THEATRE (2010-2020) (critical texts, collective work, the first comprehensive monograph on contemporary Belarusian theatre). The publication was created in collaboration with Zbigniew Raszewski Theatre Institute.
The history of Belarusian theatre at the turn of the 21st century still awaits its chronicler, someone who will attempt to provide a comprehensive overview of what happened in Belarusian theatre during the three decades of relative freedom, from the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 and the establishment of the independent state of the Republic of Belarus, to 2020 when, as a result of repression, independent Belarusian culture was completely destroyed and the rights of official culture were significantly limited. This book is composed of texts by Belarusian authors who have lost their voice in their homeland and work under pseudonyms abroad. It is the first attempt to describe the last decade (2010-2020), marked by the development of new drama and independent theatre. Irina Lappo (from the introduction)
More announcements are on the way, including an excellent film programme, panels, events for children and young people, and workshops and discussions for music professionals
East of Culture – Different Sounds is most of all a music festival. The musical acts scheduled to perform at the event are: Ladytron – the legendary group from the British electronic scene, Stian Westerhus – a Norwegian guitar virtuoso, Nuha Ruby Ra – a rising star in the British contemporary music scene, To Rococo Rot – the legends of the German music scene blending electronic music with live sound, the Italian masters of poetic vibe Dead Cat in a Bag. You can also catch live shows by Whispering Sons with their unique blend of experimental and frenetic post-punk, the Estonian duo Bedless Bones, combining – among others – dark wave, industrial, and electro elements, the Canadian duo Miesha & The Spanks, bringing a powerful fusion of garage rock, grunge, and punk, and the German project Lucy Kruger & The Lost Boys, exploring genres such as psychedelic folk, ambient punk, and art pop. We will hear excellent Polish bands – Szorstkie, Tuleje, and Atol Atol Atol, Contemporary Noise Ensemble, who are making a big comeback, Jakub Skorupa, whose career is on fire, phenomenal young groups like ta Ukrainka and Kisu Min, as well as the jazz-blues band Koń. Our eastern neighbours will be represented by projects from the alternative scene: the jazz band Hyphen Dash and the electronic music artists The Lazy Jesus and Monoconda.
East of Culture – Different Sounds
6-9 July 2023
Błonia near the Castle, Lublin
Admission free.
More information about the festival can be found at en.innebrzmienia.eu and http://www.wschodkultury.eu/
East of Culture – Different Sounds 2023 – Organisers:
The Ministry of Culture and National Heritage, The National Centre for Culture, the City of Lublin, Workshops of Culture in Lublin.
The festival has been granted honorary patronage by Krzysztof Żuk, the Mayor of Lublin, and is part of the programme of European Youth Capital Lublin 2023.
As a member of the Keychange network, our festival is committed to promoting gender balance in the music industry.