CONTEMPORARY SOLO PERFORMANCE FESTIVAL

LÄBU

Humana

by

ZHENYAN DING
China

Author and performer: ZHENYAN DING
Lighting design: ROMMI RUTTAS and LEON ALLIK
Dramaturgical support: SANDRA KÜPPER and GIACOMO VERONESI
Producers: JÜRI NAEL and ANNIKA ÜPRUS

Production: CPPM | Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre
Premiere: 6 September 2025 EMTA black box 

Here, I discovered I’d forgotten how to wear clothes.

Outside Humana’s windows, snow keeps falling.
“Labels don’t matter,” the clerk says. “Just try it on.”

But when I try to undress myself,
my right hand gets stuck in the sleeve,
trapped in the fabric.

“Are you really going to walk naked
into this snow?”

Suddenly, the collar button
starts speaking in a foreign tongue.

Mm.

Zhenyan Ding

I’m Zhenyan Ding, and I am trying to touch the boundaries of art. Although art is often measured in lifetimes, my age, approaching 30, keeps urging me to get started. For the past four years, I’ve been a professional dancer in China, collaborating with various choreographers and always connecting with audiences through my role as a dancer. I’ve also had the opportunity to experience the feeling of creation and have published several small works, like crossing a river by feeling the stones.

And when he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, ”Put out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch.” Luke 5:4