A DEEP DIVE INTO THE FAMILY
The performance enters the intimate space of the family and explores what happens when violence, poverty, lack of education and codependency become part of everyday life.
What happens when the person who is supposed to care for you is also your abuser? What happens when love becomes associated with abuse, exploitation and humiliation? And is it possible to break the patterns through which these associations are passed from one generation to the next?
MASC: FIRE AND AXE TO THOSE WHO BENT
MASC explores toxic masculinity and the ways in which rigid ideas about masculinity shape relationships, families and communities. It looks at the rejection of vulnerability, the pressure to be tough and emotionally restrained, and the connection between masculinity, power and dominance.
At the centre of the performance is a boy growing up in a provincial patriarchal society, shaped by deeply rooted beliefs about the role of men. From an early age, he experiences violence, bullying, rejection and exclusion because of his difference.
TOXIC MASCULINITY
The performance explores three interconnected patterns: the rejection of everything perceived as soft or feminine, the expectation that men must be tough and emotionally controlled, and the idea that male value is connected to power, dominance, status and the ability to command respect.
Rather than treating these patterns as abstract ideas, MASC looks at how they are experienced in everyday life and how they affect the people living inside them.
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THE BODY OF THE TEXT
The performance is built from personal testimonies collected from everyday people in Ukraine. These testimonies are intertwined with literature, poetry, statistics, scientific research and texts created by the team. The work also enters into dialogue with the writing of Édouard Louis, particularly The End of Eddy, A Woman’s Battles and Transformations, and Who Killed My Father.
MASC brings these different materials together to explore how violence, shame, vulnerability and ideas of masculinity are formed and reproduced within families and society.
