STF 2026: Rūta Ronja Pakalne & Laura Gorodko (EE/LV) „Freedom to Lose Control Together with the Many“

Rūta Ronja Pakalne & Laura Gorodko (EE/LV) performance „Freedom to Lose Control Together with the Many“ takes place during STF 2026. The performance is followed by the festival closing party. Get festival passes and more info HERE.

Freedom to Lose Control Together With the Many is an immersive performance experience in which we invite you to create and be part of a safe and inclusive space together in the given time and place. An informal dance party/meditative rave performance that is based on utopian ideas about the perfect society. Everyone is invited to surrender to rhythmic electronic music and to lose control together with the many. 

Audience members have a chance to choose what kind of participation they feel the most comfortable with (active participant, observed or switch whenever they feel like it). A space that gives the audience a possibility to be part of a non pressure environment, by following the guidance of the performers and making decisions for themselves.

Rūta Ronja Pakalne is a Latvian-Estonian freelance dance and film artist based in Estonia. Her interdisciplinary practice spans choreography, performance, filmmaking, and teaching, investigating body, presence, and everyday experience. She holds a BA in Choreography from the Latvian Academy of Culture, further training at P.A.R.T.S. in Brussels, and an MA in Film Arts from TLU, BFM. Since 2019 she has been a lecturer at Baltic Film, Media and Arts School of Tallinn University. Currently also teaching at MUBA (Tallinn Ballet School) and ETA Tantsukool. She has been sharing her practice and teaching throughout schools in the Baltics. 

Her recent projects include The Space Between Us Is Not Empty (2025), Body of Dreams (2023)—a co-creation with Laura Kvelstein exploring body archives, Freedom to Lose Control Together with the Many (2023)-a co-creation with Laura Gorodko. She also creates experimental dance films that explore movement and embodied storytelling, her most recent work is a dance-architecture film H61 (2024) that is part of a project Dance+City by Lithuanian Dance information centre and ARTE Channel.

Laura Gorodko is a contemporary dance artist based in Riga, Latvia. She is a board member of the Choreographers Association of Latvia and a member of the dance collective LDM5. In 2018, she graduated from the Latvian Academy of Culture with a BA in Contemporary Dance Art. She works as a freelance choreographer, dancer, and movement teacher. Laura has performing experience in contemporary dance, circus, and transdisciplinary performing arts. She has been performing in the site-specific performance Laika Nospiedumi over the past two years. As a performer, she has also taken part in the contemporary dance production FEMINA by the dance collective LDM5.

Directors, choreographers: Rūta Ronja Pakalne, Laura Gorodko
DJ / music selector: oneanders
Duration: 45 min
Trigger warning: The performance includes loud sounds, flashing lights, smoke or similar effects.

The performance is accessible with a wheelchair and there is no language barrier