Romeo and Juliet

Moscow Art Theatre school graduation project.

In Shakespeare's play, war becomes a constant, default condition. Everywhere on the streets there are fights, murders, and two families living in the same city no longer remember the reasons for their enmity. The newly born feeling of love between the two main characters - Romeo and Juliet - soon dies along with the lovers themselves. War cannot suppress a warm and strong feeling, but it can take the lives of those in whose hearts it was born.

The space of the school class becomes a safe corner, the last place that the war has not yet had time to touch. Here Romeo and Juliet meet and send each other the first crumpled notes with confessions. This is where all the fights take place after lessons and lines. Here parents say goodbye to their children.

Like buildings abandoned after a catastrophe, this classroom is empty, and people in it are replaced by plants. The war, which is getting closer and closer to the school, turns the classroom into a Garden of Eden - a living corner where flowers from all over the school will be stored. In an empty and dusty classroom, Romeo and Juliet can still say words of love to each other - write with chalk on the blackboard and immediately erase before anyone sees.