Sirenos’26: “Traps”

Have you ever felt trapped — in a space, in your own thoughts, or in patterns you created yourself? As if invisible mechanisms hold you in place, and no matter how hard you try, you cannot break free?

“Traps” is a performance by Ukrainian creator Rita Lira, blending dance, theatre, sculpture, architecture, and urban poetry into a single visual and emotional composition.

The work explores the feeling of being psychologically and physically stuck — a suspended state where body, emotions, and imagination become part of the same confinement. It unfolds as a dialogue between the city and the human being living within it, like a fragmented poem written in movement and space.

The idea was born from a personal experience described by the artist: a sleepless night marked by anxiety and paralysis, where even thoughts felt immobilized. This moment became a realization that the imagination itself can become a trap — one that is difficult to escape.

Lira’s artistic practice combines contemporary dance, street dance influences, visual art, and documentary approaches. Her work is deeply connected to reflections on displacement, war, and psychological states of confinement.

“Traps” continues her exploration of borders — both physical and internal — asking how, or whether, liberation is possible at all.