Circus Trends - A Year Around About Circus
Contemporary circus can be an artistic language for decoding our complex relationship with society and opening new perspectives on how we see the world around us. Since its foundation in 2022, the digital platform Around About Circus has visited festivals and experienced shows, often enlarging the spectrum of participation by hosting various collaborators' opinions and reflections. Our way of experiencing the circus brings other disciplines into the speculative discourse and connects interpretations. This article will elaborate on the platform’s journey through circus writing and gather some thoughts exchanged with the artists, learning more about their practices. Combined with a glimpse at the three issues of VOICES magazine, edited by the German CircusDanceFestival, it proposes a gaze on contemporary circus aesthetics. Circus Trends - A Year Around About Circus explores the trajectories of current creations, reflecting on participation, care, autofiction, and movement research, connecting the topics with the current perspectives of Posthumanism, New Materialism and Object-oriented ontology.
This article is the written result of a lecture I gave within the framework of the three-day conference Circus Today: Aesthetics, Politics, Technology, curated by the Polish website dedicated to contemporary circus, Sztuka Cyrku, and the Polish foundation Fundacja Sztukmistrze.
Frequently, I start masterclasses by asking the participants: “What is contemporary circus for you?”. At Around About Circus, the kind of contemporary circus we are interested in does not see virtuosity at its core but is oriented toward understanding its relationship with the apparatus and is at the service of storytelling. This fundamentally reveals what Around About Circus is: a platform to provide a sense of discovery, a place dedicated to contemporary circus's professional, experimental aspect at the intersection with other stage arts.
Since contemporary circus can be an artistic language for decoding our complex relationship with society and opening new perspectives on how we see the world around us, the first trend in the contemporary circus sector that I found relevant to mention is the non-human turn that in the last few decades, has represented a new paradigm in circus as a relational art.
As a freelancer, I am also in charge of developing the international relations of CircusDanceFestival, a German institution based in Cologne that, since 2020, has produced an academic magazine called VOICES dedicated to hosting current theoretical reflections on circus work. In 2022 the festival collaborated with the German publisher Theater der Zeit on a book, Circus in Flux - edited by Tim Behren and Jenny Patschovsky - entirely dedicated to contemporary circus as an art form. The book contains a VOICES issue entitled Re-thinking Objects, entirely dedicated to the non-human turn and the different nuances and experiences in contemporary circus around object manipulation. As performance proposals, they all share an interest that can be seen as based on the interaction between human and non-human agents. In this frame, non-human principal agents are understood to be objects, technologies, equipment or apparatuses, animals, and powers, like gravity.
Inside the 2022 VOICES issue dedicated to the non-human turn in contemporary circus, articles such as (More than) Human? by Franziska Trapp and The Dislocated Object by Tim Behren underline how neo-materialistic philosophical, feminist and scientific aspects of the interplay between body, object and space have increasingly found their way into the reflection and artistic practice of circus since the mid-90s.
Object-oriented ontology appeared in 2009 as a rephrase of the term “object-oriented philosophy” coined by philosopher Graham Harman at the end of the Nineties. Since the term has been brought into the circus scene via juggling as an awareness that objects have an agency of their own, and that brings the juggler into motion, its consequential attitude can be traced in various contemporary circus practitioners. Object-oriented ontology influenced the perception of circus virtuosity. If, in the traditional circus, the performer was at the centre of the stage exhibiting virtuosity, then this later developed into the performer allowing the object they are interacting with to have agency and interfere with their movements. This shifting paradigm allows a more horizontal relationship between performer and space apparatuses, or objects.
At the beginning of the Nineties, some jugglers started wanting to move with their juggling and considered a dialogue between the body and the object. The English-German dancer and juggler Benjamin Richter started performing when this trend began; then, the ideal partnership with an object was very different from what juggling could be, oriented to dominating it, demonstrating willingness through a declared intention. On the contrary, Benjamin and other jugglers were more attracted to revealing the precious element of fragility in manipulation: giving agency to objects and the question "who is moving who" found its way. His piece TAKTil is founded on the principle of fragile technique; he calls his principal tool "the language of objects" and sets the juggler as the one with the ability and scope to communicate the nature of objects to the world. In TAKTil, Benjamin creates sculptures he can interact with, which highlight the fragility, risk and connection and address the attention to the objects' tactile perception. The endurance piece creates a sensitive dialogue of object manipulation, making the qualities of his non-human partners tangible for everyone present.
How can a human subject - as a performer - be influenced by non-human objects? Listening to the objects' language and being influenced by them allows the performer to create a language based on their exchange. This aspect implies an extra step in non-anthropocentric relations and is certainly present in the development intentions of Andrea Salustri's MATERIA, a performance in which the object-oriented ontology brings us a step forward: the polystyrene becomes a living material capable of interacting with the settled installation sculptures and the air circulating in motion. Here, the focus is not on how the staged objects influence the performer but on how objects can influence each other, questioning the dualism between the subject and the object. In his article Object and Perception, Andrea Salustri expands on this concept.
Object-oriented ontology can be traced in the artistic practice of Saar Rombout, an aerial artist and rope designer who through rigging creates installative structures made of ropes that she can interact with. In her case, rigging as a creative and design tool became part of her artistic practice, while the ropes played an active role.
In the so-called New Materialism approach in contemporary circus, matter no longer functions as a passive channel for human action. Under this trend, I can list examples of authors who developed a special relationship with objects and apparatuses in their shows.
The Flemish choreographer Alexander Vantournhout explores body interactions and plays with human proportions through movement relations, morphing practices and object interactions. In his solo VanThorhout, the relationship between object and performer quickly becomes ambiguous. In his hands, a hammer as a tool becomes an extension of his body that moves in harmony with it. The use and consequent movements of this apparatus on stage open questions about the heaviness of the object and the light movement of his body rotating and using the hammer as a counterweight. Associated with strength and dominance as a symbol of war; here, the hammer became a symbol of peace and mastery in a world of physics forces at work.
PLI by the Israeli based in France circus and visual artist Inbal Ben Haim, shaped in collaboration with Alexis Mérat (folder-paper crusher) and Domitille Martin (plastic artist and scenographer) represents another example of empowerment of the object focusing on its materials characteristics. In her piece, the apparatus becomes an ephemeral architecture and a new suspension tool: an aerial paper rope. Paper is not only manipulated by Inbal, but it manipulates her back. The paper universe on stage is constructed each time for each occasion. The need to be attentive and listen to the material while performing is palpable as it can break anytime.
The Czech performer Victor Čhernický also entitled PLI his architecture-dance show. Combining rhythm and movement research, the author tries to control and deconstruct the architectural balance of a group of chairs. The show is a physical metaphor for endless human dynamics. How does he manifest his human will and agency on these inanimate others? PLI explores these points while avoiding moralistic positions. During this performance without music, where the sound of his steps became an obsessively repeated rhythm impossible to escape from, humour navigates between absurd and situational, as perfectly timed physical comedy runs through the performance.
In the context of possible circus trends, EZ by the Italian Catalan-based Elena Zanzu can be seen at the intersection of New Materialism, Auto-fiction, Movement Research and Care. EZ explores the power dynamics and the consent between the artist and the audience, who are directly invited to participate. Some of the main questions that move the performance are: What happens when a human body is consensually tied and manipulated on stage? What are the reactions - physical, emotional, and cognitive - that occur in a person being manipulated, in a person manipulating and in a person observing the manipulation? In 2023 Elena Zanzu participated in the VOICES issue dedicated to the topic of Grotesque with the article EZ – Some practices of No, where he invites the readers to discover his first-person performative universe approach.
Entitled Re-exploring the Grotesque, the 2023 issue of VOICES collected texts reflecting on what the term Grotesque can mean in its complexity and ambivalence, and what it can tell us about the diversity of bodies and body images in circus and dance today.
With the topic of Autofiction, the possibility of using contemporary circus at the service of a personal story emerges. This is the case of Laura Murphy in A Spectacle of Herself, who alongside the director Ursula Martinez shaped a show that mixes stand-up comedy, rope acts and a sharp look at the dominant figures and narratives in our society. Speaking in first person, on stage Laura merges their practice as a circus performance maker with their desire to critique or respond to current political and social debates. From her PhD thesis Deconstructing the Spectacle: Aerial Performance as Critical Practice, to their first solo Contra and their latest A Spectacle of Herself, their journey through performing is a parable of connection between the personal and the collective storytelling gaze, mixing inner bibliography and active imagination with a willingness to deconstruct what is superficially spectacular at first look. On Around About Circus - and in collaboration with Dynamo Magazine - Elena Stanciu and I dedicated a long interview with them and Nicole A’Court Stuart with whom they founded their UK-based label, Contra Productions.
Another example of Autofiction is the show Delusional - I Killed a Man by Diana Salles, which she shaped together with the circus director Firenza Guidi. The show is dedicated to the world transforming around and inside Diana, as a performer who stages her experience of gender transition and frames actions and emotions connected to her ritual of passage through circus language.
Glorious Bodies by the Flemish company Circumstances led by the choreographer Piet Van Dyke stages the memories of a group of performers aged over 57, exploring the theme of the body as an archive. On stage, the group performs the tricks they used more than 20 years ago. By revealing their personal stories through their bodies, the lens focuses on the fragility and strength of their physical actions, emotionally merging their past and present personalities.
Miss Sbarbie by Morgana Morandi also stages memories of the past – in her case, her Barbie dolls - but at the service of a current context, the identity re-appropriation of a body. The show, subtitled A Punk Collective History About Our Messed-up Bodies, focuses on the re-appropriation of a symbol, that of Barbie, which has imprisoned the female imagination with its aesthetic canon but is also a symbol of liberation for the imagination.
Posthumanism as a trend in contemporary circus suggests a perspective that challenges traditional human-centred views, aiming to disrupt hierarchies and boundaries between humans and other entities. This is the case of the circus artist and clown Lithuanian Marija Baranauskaité and their artistic projects addressed to a non-human audience. Her debut show, The Sofa Project, is written for an audience made of old sofas. In her second show, the itinerant The Duck Performance, alongside other spectators, you experience the world around you as, and act like, a duck. This encourages you to act differently, respecting bright equity between you and the animals that coexist in a city. CircusDanceFestival produced a documentary about the project which is free to watch on the festival’s website media library.
Through audience interaction contemporary circus can become a form of relational art, implying that audiences can change the performance by participating actively from the inside.
Listening to a talk by the company Be Flat in the frame of ON CIRCUS conference days during the last edition of Theater op de Markt, we learn that in an in-situ performance such as their best-known show Follow Me, the spatial relationship of how to move collectively is a central element of safety when a collective takes action in the public dimension. Contrary to their previous works conceived in big outdoor locations, their new creation, LIVING, is staging circuses in houses for the elderly, public libraries, and potentially every indoor place that is lived in collectively.
Another example of circus as relational art is Collectif Malunés We Agree to Disagree. The audience is invited to enter the circus space, reply to the performers' questions, interact and move constantly. This kind of interaction can be defined as “porous dramaturgy,” which, in the words of the British artist and researcher Cathy Turner who collaborated with the company, defined itself by audience involvement in the co-creation of the performance “through the underlying concepts and formal structures, in particular, interactivity, immersion and site-specificity.”
Movement research can be seen as a constant element accompanying contemporary circus creation rather than a trend. However, imagining it as a subcategory, I selected four examples of content to underline a special relationship between new apparatuses and movement research.
Through movement research using her body inside the apparatus, Alice Rende created a relationship with a contained space. Fora is her indoor solo staging of contortion combined with other techniques in a tall rectangular box made of plexiglass. In her interview, she explains the challenges of experimenting with an unusual transparent cage and the aesthetic reception of contortion as a discipline in contemporary circus.
In their performance, Masha, the Catalan company Palimsesta interacts with a new apparatus, a linoleum floor strip, on which they move, sliding on body oil. By choosing a bifrontal stage, an impalpable connection between performers and spectators is spread in the air as they confront each other. The piece becomes a live laboratory, testing the audience's temperature as they study both the performers and the observers opposite.
From the verticality of a plexiglass cage to the horizontal dimension of a linoleum strip, we come to the movement research of the Flemish company Sinking Sideways, involved in researching repetition and its evolution as a human juggling technique in their shows, René and Cécile. Then there is the trio's Knot on Hands, exploring partner acrobatics as architecture in their indoor shows Brace for impact and Concrete, and their outdoor site-specific Passing By.
The concept of Care as a trend in contemporary circus is quite recent. Its presence reflects the change of attention to peripheral aspects of show business that can become central in the fruition and perception of the final result of experiencing a show. Welcoming different spectators' needs and reflecting on how to improve our daily lives and be human by accepting our frailties and singularities is also becoming a fundamental consideration in circus creation.
In recent years, how to welcome a neurodivergent audience to a show has brought the term relaxed performances to our attention in the sector. The Flemish company Side-Show declared her interest in shaping a new trajectory using this approach. With their Permit, oh Permit My Soul to Rebel, they explained how to play with the rules of creating a circus-relaxed performance and the values in place on stage and behind the scenes.
Mentir lo minimo is a special mention connected to this theme because of the personal touch and minimal taste used on stage. Alternating monologues, using minimal music and an acrobatic bicycle, the Spanish duo based in France Alta Gama speaks openly about their relationship with their bodies. The more the show advances, the smaller the stage becomes, inviting a circle of spectators to witness their performance from a very close view, creating a magical atmosphere of intimacy reflected in their stage's use.
What will be the future trends and topics of contemporary circus? Curiosity will guide us in forthcoming explorations to seek out innovative creations. The media trajectory is to expand as a digital archive and meet behind the scenes the people who make all this possible. As a digital project, we will continue to stay observant and shape a collective independent narrative dedicated to an interdisciplinary audience with an interest in circus culture. We hope you will be part of this journey.