the vegetarian

Video work based on the novel by Han Kang. Directed by Evgeniya Safonova. Sound by Elizaveta Kuzyakova, DOP Alexei Rodionov, Alte Chirurgie Theater, Heidelberg, Germany, 2025.

For this stage adaptation of The Vegetarian, Alinna Tikhonova developed the complete moving image environment for the performance.

Rather than illustrating the narrative, she wanted the moving image to become part of the psychological and spatial language of the work. Across three vertical screens, the female body gradually transforms into vegetal forms, extending the protagonist’s inner transformation beyond the physical stage.

The project explores the body not as a fixed identity but as a process of continuous transformation, where the boundaries between human, plant, memory, and imagination slowly dissolve.

For her, it was important that the video did not function as a backdrop, but as an active part of the scenography — another living presence within the performance that shaped the emotional and perceptual space together with the actors, light, and sound.

The work also exists as a standalone video artwork, presented as an installation.