A vibrant new work featuring 13 Carpatho-Rusyn language songs and dances.

Mark Dillon, courtesy of the Rusin Association of Minnesota
Published: March 26, 2025

On April 25, Alexandra Bodnarchuk and her company Doma Dance Theater graced Minneapolis’s Southern Theater with a vibrant new work featuring 13 Carpatho-Rusyn language songs and dances. Doma’s performance was the exuberant finale of the annual Candy Box Dance Festival’s Featured Artist performances that night. Bodnarchuk, and dancers Non Edwards, Odessa Rain and Yukina Sato were clad in specially-made costumes that seem to blend traditional womenswear from the Šambron and Poloniny regions of Eastern Slovakia  with a more modern look.

The work Doma performed was the fully realized version of the work they performed for the Rusin Association during the In-Process Showing for the Rusin Association on Feb. 2 as part of its 2025 Duchnovič Day festivities. The team embraced in circle dances and swirling S line movements in syncopated harmony to songs that included I Walk Through the Mountains (Po Horach Chodylam).

The folk songs featured in the work are from the Šambron and Poloniny regions of Eastern Slovakia, and were sung live by Mila Vocal Ensemble. The Šambron region borders Poland along the Dunajec river, and is home to the Stará L’ubovňa castle. The Poloniny region sits in the northeastern most portion of the country and borders both Poland and Ukraine. Here you can find the Poloniny National Park and Starina Reservoir, the construction of which displaced inhabitants from seven Carpatho Rusyn villages.  

The theater venue, with its stark weathered facade and back drop and close-to-the-stage seating, provided a much more intimate setting than the earlier gym venue. Doma succeeded in transporting the audience to the lush Carpathian hills on a romantic, bonfire-lit summer night.

Bodnarchuk describes her work as “drawing …  “together her ethnic heritage with contemporary movement practices. Centering the body as a tangible site of culture, she explores questions of self-expression, community, dispossession, and cross-cultural identity.”

Several members of the Carpatho-Rusyn Society traveled from Pennsylvania and Oklahoma to view the performance, with one noting that she supplied some of the ribbons for the dancers’ costumes. Both Alexandra and Odessa originally hail from Pennsylvania. 

The night also featured several dance numbers by the eight-member Flying Foot Forum group that seemed to blend Irish Riverdance, very high quality tap dancing and a poignant waltz by an older couple.

With men clad in suit vests and women in 1940s dresses, Flying Foot complemented Doma’s work and seemed to recall 19 th century and post-World War II immigration journeys and adaptation to life in America.

Songs played during Doma’s performance included:

Odprašaňa po Šambriňskŷ, Šambron 
Po Horach Chodylam, Poloniny
Nechcu Paradnoho, Šambron
Možete Mamočko, Šambron
Tak Jem Ša Vŷdava, Šambron
A Za Našom Chŷžom, Šambron
Nepyj Koňu Vodu, Poloniny
Povava, Povava, Šambron
Ňit Koho v Šambroňi Lubiti, Šambron
Chodyly Zme v Šŷroj Pole, Poloniny
Poplačeš Ty Haňko, Poloniny
Parta Moja, Šambron
Bŷva Ja Ďivočka, Šambron