Circus in the UK: a combined perspective London & Newcastle partners
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Circus in the UK
A Combined Perspective
CIRCUS IN THE UK: A COMBINED PERSPECTIVE LONDON & NEWCASTLE
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This document is the result of a European Union funded collaboration between Belgium, Hungary, Spain, The Czech Republic and The UK. Of the two UK partners one was based in London (in the South East of England and one was based in Northumberland (in the North East of England) This report is based on feedback from the partners in this project and from members of the circus sector in the UK. 1. WHAT STYLES OF CIRCUS EXIST IN YOUR COUNTRY? Although London produces and attracts considerable circus activity and talent there is not a ‘North South divide’ in circus in the UK. There is a school of thought that suggests that there is more similarity between circus’s in the metropolis cities of different countries than there is between a metropolis city circus and a non metropolis or rural circus in the same country. Both traditional circus and contemporary circus thrive in the UK. However, they offer different lifestyles and tend to attract different types of artists and audiences so there is less ‘cross-over’ than one might imagine. Indeed, there is something of a friendly rivalry between the two groups. The experience of the partner countries involved in this project is more focused on contemporary circus, so we will be talking more about that style. International circus’s visit and tour the UK but the UK also generates its own traditional and contemporary circus. The UK has a wide circuit for international touring circus productions on small and large scale and is an attractive market for international companies. The UK sees annual visits from large international contemporary companies such as Cirque du Soleil (arena shows only) as well as theatre and festival tours from companies such as Circa (Australia), Cirque Eloize, Cirque Alfonse, 7 Digits (Canada), Over the past 10 years street art and street circus have become more popular – particularly in cities that attract visitors and tourists. Circus has also merged as an ‘added value’ item within London’s West End shows. Audiences have increasingly high expectations of onstage special effects, performances and ‘wow’ moments so disciplines like ballet, dance, opera, theatre and popular music have begun to ‘borrow’ circus skills and incorporate it in their work. The traditional, contemporary, street expression and ‘borrowed’ styles of circus all coexist in the UK – both imported and home grown. Community Circus is big in the UK and has developed along a lineage from people such as Ali Williams, Reg Bolton, Mike Mallony and Donal McKendry. Many contemporary companies such as No Fit State Circus, Albert & Friends Instant Circus, Swamp Circus all began as a community circus. These developed as groups of people who gathered together in order to share the pursuit of circus. Aspirations are not always professional; community groups usually include high skilled elders and younger members, and include people who specialise in different disciplines. Often the notion of ‘school’ or ‘circus’ is built around a group, and the legacy of passing on skills to others is developed. Community circus often ties its aims to social and personal development and not just physical attainment. There is a crossover with ‘Social Circus’, where circus is combined with ‘Social Work’ to work with participants at risk of exclusion from parts of society, or with particular needs. The term ‘Social Circus’ is debated within the UK, often it is seen as something that they do ‘in other countries’ – many argue that all teachers have a social remit with their participants, so why add the term ‘social’ to the genre circus, whereas others argue that the delineation allows for more detailed research, understanding and exploration of the polymathic nature of circus. 2. WHERE ARE SOME GREAT PLACES TO EXPERIENCE CIRCUS PERFORMANCES? LONDON AREA: • The Albany: a local arts centre and venue • Covent Garden: an area of London that attracts a lot of tourists and therefore a lot of street artists – performances • tend to be restricted to equilibristics, clowning, acrobatics and fire. http://www.coventgardenlondonuk.com/ • Arts Depot: a cultural hub and a performance venue in North Finchley, London – they support artists through residences and they have a circus-specific residency programme. They frequently host and commission contemporary circus as part of their public events programme. https://www.artsdepot.co.uk/
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• Jacksons Lane: a community arts centre that is particularly involved in circus – it supports experimental and innovative work and has a strong history in contemporary dance and circus. They programme a lot of contemporary circus from new artists small-scale pieces to large-scale circus shows. They run an annual circus festival. http://www.jacksonslane.org.uk/ • Greenwich+Docklands Festival: London’s annual leading festival of free outdoor performing arts (end of June-early July) http://www.festival.org/ • Hangar Arts Trust: primarily a circus training/act/show creation space, but each December hosts a two day show involving work from mini-students to adult students and professional artists (Greenwich Circus Festival) http:// hangarartstrust.org/ • National Centre for Circus Arts (BA Hons degree in Circus Arts) – based in Hoxton, North London. www.nationalcircus.org.uk/ • The Roundhouse: this operates, in the main, as a venue but has a particularly strong interest in circus. It supports the creation of new work, produces some of its own circus works; programmes a lot of large-scale contemporary circus shows and runs a circus festival every second year. http://www.roundhouse.org.uk/ • Saddlers Wells – Peacock Theatre: Sadler’s Wells is a world leader in contemporary dance – it has a history of staging circus. The larger scale dance/circus based work is shown at the Peacock. http://www.sadlerswells.com/ • Southbank – udderbelly Festival: This partnership with London’s Southbank Centre is a 8-week summer programme of comedy, circus and entertainment inside an inflatable upside-down purple cow. http://www.southbankcentre.co.uk/ • Southbank – wonderground: a 1920s Paradiso Spiegeltent tent and temporary runs alongside Udderbelly, featuring circus and cabaret shows of scale and quality. http://www.southbankcentre.co.uk/ • Stratford Circus: Stratford Circus is a contemporary performing arts venue in Stratford in the London Borough of Newham THE REST OF THE UK Festival based – Bristol’s Circus City, Bristol Harbour Festival (June), Fuse Medway Festival, Glastonbury (June), Inside Out Dorset, Stockton International River Festival (August), Out There Festival in Great Yarmouth (September), The Crawley Circus Festival, Festival of Fools and Carnival of Colours in Northern Ireland (May), Download and Wilderness festivals, Play Festival in Wales (August) – not an exhaustive list by any means. Venue Based – Blackpool Tower Circus (NW England); The Lowry, Salford (NW England) Community Based – Bristol – Circomedia and The Invisible Circus; Cardiff – No Fit State Circus; Newcastle – Circus Central 3. IF YOU WERE TO ADVISE 3 PLACES TO GO TO EXPERIENCE CIRCUS PERFORMANCE IN YOUR COUNTRY, WHERE WOULD THEY BE AND WHY? Answer from London Here we try to reflect the range of circus viewing experiences available in London – and what we might do with limited time: • Jacksons Lane: to see new, innovative, and experimental work and see circus as the centre of a community arts hub • The Roundhouse: to see spectacular large scale circus with mass appeal, in the round • Wonderground: to experience world class circus in its tented environment and observe mainstream circus audiences • Greenwich & Docklands Festival: to experience international outdoor circus with diverse interpretations on a grand scale Answer from Newcastle ENCI
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• When money is no option, it is hard to beat a visit to the Edinburgh Fringe. The best world-wide companies play Edinburgh – particularly small to medium scale contemporary shows in indoor venues. In a single day one can see half a dozen shows from new to established companies – and experience a lot of street theatre as well. • NoFitState Circus is one of the big jewels in the crown of large scale touring contemporary UK circus, the company has tent-based and spectacle based shows, as well as a range of smaller scale work. Seeing a tent show or a large scale outdoor work is a must. The company has a honed style and great skills. • Glastonbury Festival: It’s epic – there is big, there is small, there is a lot of it. Probably the largest single annual gathering of contemporary circus folk in the UK, if not the western world. 24 hour art/music/entertainment features circus heavily in many areas, not just the dedicated circus/theatre fields, which is home to a nomadic community of several thousand artists a year. 4. IF YOU WERE TO RECOMMEND 3 WAYS OF LEARNING CIRCUS IN YOUR COUNTRY, WHAT WOULD THEY BE? Answer from London • Formal study with Aircraft Circus through their foundation and level 2 circus courses. • Then take a circus degree at the National Centre of Circus Arts. • Join Hangar Arts Trust – attend open practice sessions; network with circus artists/teachers/directors/producers; access subsidised space hire; immerse yourself in our circus community; check out classes, find paid circus work, make friends. Answer from the North • Join a Local Youth Circus. In Newcastle join the Five Ring Circus at Circus Central there are many other youth circuses e.g. if you live in Wookey Hole as a teenager and train with Wookey Hole Youth Circus, a professional youth company that performs maybe 200 shows per year. • Be nomadic and tour the country for 1 year and reside in 20 places that have a community circus, whilst visiting juggling conventions along the way. Learn from your peers and pass on your skills as you go. • Travel internationally, don’t limit yourself to the UK. 5. TALK ABOUT SOME MARKETS OF CIRCUS IN YOUR COUNTRY. 5.1 Casted circus artists: auditions for artists with circus skills for shows are regular in London and the pay is reasonable. 5.2 Off the shelf shows: Venues in the UK are keen to programme circus so there is considerable potential for work in both creating and delivering shows – however, venues report that they need to work with companies who know how to develop and bring their own audience to the venue, rather than relying on the venue to fill the seats. Many years ago venues would buy in shows and artists would be paid an agreed sum to perform their show – but recently the model has moved towards a profit share after all costs are covered – that can mean a level of considerable risk for the performance company. 5.3 Commissioned shows: In order to get funding for a show in the UK you will need to approach funders of the arts – they fall into two main categories – government funding of the arts and philanthropic funders. Philanthropic funding is a huge subject and ranges from approaching individuals to applying to grant-giving charities and private trusts. Recent comment and figures suggest that funders tend to fund in the region of 20% of applications – it can take anything from a day to a couple of months to complete and application. Government funding of circus is allocated at national level through The Arts Council – this involves putting in an application to get your new work funded – information can be found at www.artscouncil.org.uk/funding/ www. Government funding at local level comes via local councils who seek to animate their community events with circus acts and/or shows. They tend to have ideas/themes they want to communicated, which can often mean creating new work. Many council procurers do not understand the cost of creating/delivering circus, so commissioned shows for local councils are rarely fully funded and only work as a form of income if you are supported by
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volunteers or match-funding. One option is to work with the council to modify a set of acts/show that you have ‘ready to go’ thus making the project financially viable. 5.4 Commissioned acts: Circus has become more popular with audiences and this is reflected in product marketing and corporate branding. Aerial circus is particularly appropriate for communicating brand image and corporate culture; it involves the concepts of strength, flight, soaring – which are all linked to power, winning and achieving. The experience of viewing aerial work results in awe, wonder and appreciation of beauty – all things will fit well with aspirant corporate launches/ events. As such there is demand for acts for corporate launches/events – but they will require specific work linked to their brand and event plans. This is very well paid work and it is possible to adapt existing acts with brand-matched/linked costumes. However, some clients will require you to use a pre-selected music associated with their brand or event – and that often means creating new work. The client will likely need additional advice and work to include appropriate equipment hire and rigging – they frequently do not have detailed knowledge of what it is that they are trying to create – so it is important to scope the work out fully before committing. 5.5 Off the shelf acts: There is considerable demand for good ‘off the shelf’ solo/multiple acts – it is well paid and the least expensive way to ‘buy circus’ in the UK. It appeals to a range of organisations seeking to purchase content or animate events (e.g: public/private events, corporate events, party venues, pop up party nights, night clubs and open air shows). 5.6 Tasters, workshops and parties for adults: The growth of circus alongside the increased profile it has in both entertainment and the media has encouraged people to create circus-based events around; reunions, bride’s Hen Parties, groom’s Stag parties and adult birthday parties. This has created a lot of work for the sector, although you will need to be affiliated with an organisation that has the infrastructure to be able to provide the appropriately rigged space, are able to market these services and have the experience necessary to deal with all the contractual/legal and insurance requirements. 5.7 Tasters, workshops and parties for children: Schools, parents and guardians have become more informed about the many developmental/wellbeing benefits of circus – this enthusiasm is supported by children’s eagerness to engage in circus. However, circus birthday parties that involve the hire of appropriately rigged space/equipment, and trained teachers tend to generate more enquiries than confirmed sales – this is because parents do not fully understand the costs of delivering circus – and in comparison to say a ‘face painting’ party circus ranks amongst the most expensive options for a children’s party. 5.8 Circus as keep fit: As more people become audiences for circus and more people seek to become/remain fit there is a drive towards ‘keeping fit in a more exciting way’. There is a sector of the ‘keep fit’ community that does not want to have to attend a gym regularly and looks to alternatives. Although the general public have embraced ‘circus training as fitness training’ the circus sector have been somewhat slow on the uptake. As such there are many people seeking out circusbased activities instead of ‘gym clubs’ but few circus companies marketing directly to them. It should not be for the client to have to find a circus class to attend in order to keep fit – it should be down to the circus community to identify and package the opportunity; this is not being done so there is a gap in the market that could offer considerable income to those who appropriately position themselves. 5.9 Circus as a leisure pursuit: The concept of leisure pursuits and ‘circus as keep fit’ have become blurred in the UK – many people involve themselves in keep fit activities because it delivers on their physical, social and leisure aspirations. Therefore the same comments apply to the matter of addressing circus as a leisure pursuit. There is no necessity to create a new curriculum for circus training for the public in the UK – it just needs marketing differently to different target groups. 5.10 Circus as an experience: The concept of circus as a novel experience is very appealing in the UK – members of the public have responded very favourably to pop-up circus classes or specific ‘skills tasters’ at outdoor festivals, fares and in parks. This is done in partnership with the organiser of the event or the management company who run the parks or venues. Experiences like this have encouraged people to check on line for other circus-based experiences and this has led to a number of circus schools and venues setting up experience tasters and workshops. 5.11 Teaching amateurs: There is huge demand and considerable dearth of good reliable circus teachers in the UK – for two reasons: 1) circus is still an infant industry so we await a sizable body of experienced, qualified teachers with formal training and routes to employment 2) circus artists can see teaching as something they do when they are not performing – although understandable from their perspective, it makes it hard for schools to operate sustainably and with consistency. So being a ‘circus skills teacher’ rather than ‘teaching when you are not preforming’ presents a huge career opportunity.
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5.12 Teaching children: There is also a dearth of good reliable circus teachers for children in the UK – for the same reasons as stated in item 5.11. There is huge demand, however, working with children requires additional training, checks supervision – and liaison with parents/carers, so it is more expensive to work with children than adults (from an admin/ teaching perspective) – this is compounded by the fact that children cannot command the same hourly fee as adults – despite the delivery costs being higher. 5.13 Teaching those with learning disabilities: There is also a dearth of good reliable circus teachers for this group (again, see item 5.11). This work is usually commissioned by schools/agencies that represent this group and there is huge demand, yet the same challenges apply. Teaching this group poses further additional costs. You need higher supervision levels, appropriately adapted space; additionally trained teachers, additional carer liaison, higher teacher-student ratio and teaching personnel consistency. Unless fully funded, this work it is not something that covers its costs – or is to be considered lightly. 5.14 Teaching professionals: The same issues outlined in section 5.11 exist. This is further complicated by the fact that professionals will expect a teacher to have considerable and up to date experience of performing – so that can present challenges – albeit not insurmountable ones. 5.15 Fashion photography: Just as live audiences search for more exciting performances the fashion industry strives for more exciting images in order to sell their publications and appeal to advertisers. This has resulted in a considerable amount of interest from those creating photographic content for advertisers and publishers. This in turn has led to potential income for rigged spaces and for riggers and artistic directors. It is well paid work but should really only be undertaken by the very experienced, because they will need to take a directorial, production, rigging, training and H&S role. It is work that requires considerable knowledge, skills, experience, maturity, diplomacy and confidence. 5.16 Celebrity videos and body doubling: This work is linked to the matter of fashion photography; as people’s expectations increase then the aspiration of artists also increase; the UK circus world is frequently asked to work with musical artists to help position them within circus-based cover shots, music videos, shorts and films. This creates challenges because the models/stars rarely have more than a day or so to spare for shooting – and that is insufficient time for them to build the skills and the strength required to deliver on the vision they are trying to create in their piece. This in turn creates work for artists to body double – the work is infrequent but very well paid – however, it is dependent on physical similarities with the model/ star – so it is not an easy service for circus artists to market, it is more of the type of work you get if you are well networked and have a good portfolio. 5.17 Circus consultancy for theatre and dance: The increased interest in circus and theatre’s on-going box-office mean that they are increasingly approaching circus professionals to assist them in planning circus feats and acts into their shows. This is very well paid work but requires a considerable level of knowledge and experience to manage their physical, logistical, artistic, engineering, H&S, risk analysis and budgetary needs. They will have a vision and they will need exceptional visionary and skilled problem-solvers to design and implement ideas – because in the UK you will be held responsible for delivering the solution. 5.18 Circus rigging: The market for circus riggers has also increased over the decade, in line with the audience demand for more spectacular performances and acts; demand is high and the work is well paid – however the circus rigger will often need to be part artistic director/part engineer in order to ensure client’s get what they need. This is not always recognised at the outset of the work because frequently the client is driven by a vision, rather than technical expertise. 5.19 Circus administrators: There is demand for good circus administrators in the UK, but they are hard to come by because the sector cannot afford to pay them the sort of income they would achieve by working as an administrator in another sector – this applies to all levels of administration from junior through to senior management. WHAT ARE RATES OF PAY? Pay in/around London and across the UK vary hugely, based on scale of work, length of project/contract and whether the role is permanent/temporary/one-off. The UK circus sector has no union, governing body or representing body. There is no fixed daily/weekly ‘industry rate’ accepted by artists/bookers. That position, coupled with the infancy of the industry means little research has been done into ‘rates’ so little exists in the way of payment guidelines/regulations. The Artists Union
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website (www.artistsunionengland.org.uk) discusses pay levels, however, the only figures of any legal relation are ‘The Minimum Wage’ (£6.60 p hr) and the ‘London Living Wage’ (£9.15 p hr). Performers agree their own prices; as do agents, companies and bookers. Despite lack of clarity we will try to give an overview of the income experience of UK circus workers. • Traditional touring circuses: these have a starting rate of £300 per month. • Gigs: it is not uncommon for basic skills with a decent costume to charge £150–250 per day at regular events. Some artists will command £350, others £1,000 per engagement for more unusual and skilled acts. • Theatres: weekly rates start from £280. • Cabaret slots: short acts from £50 up to the many hundreds, depending on the quality of the act/importance of event. • The market varies widely between location and performer/company. In terms of specific roles: Acceptable professional rates vary between £100-£1,000 per day. • A basic guide of £18 – £40 an hour for teaching. • A basic guide of £150 – £500 a day for rigging. • A basic guide of £150 – £500 a day for directing. • A basic guide of £100 – £250 a day for producing. • A basic guide of £10 – £20 an hour for workshop facilitation. • A basic guide of £6.70 – £9.15 an hour for arts administration at junior level. • A basic guide of £8.00 – £15 an hour for arts administration at project management level. • A basic guide of £15 – £50 an hour for arts administration at senor level. • A basic guide of £200 – £600 a day for an arts administration consultant. Depending on passport status artists may need a visa to work as an artist in the UK. The Arts Council has been appointed as a Designated Competent Body by the UK’s ‘Home Office’ and will assess applications from artists applying for Tier 1 visas to enter the UK on the basis of their exceptional talent. Artists who have exceptional promise will also be able to apply for Tier 1 visas assessed by Arts Council. They make recommendations to UK Visas & Immigration (UKVI), which will remain the decision making body for the allocation of all visas, including Tier 1. – See more at: http://www.artscouncil.org.uk. TALK ABOUT SOME OF THE MAIN CENTRES OR HUBS OF CIRCUS London is the UK’s capital and the largest city in terms of population, financial turnover and tourism. It also leads in finance, culture, politics and power. A lot of circus goes on in London; this is because of the tourist and visitor factor that generates both the audience numbers to justify the work and the disposable income to fund its performance. As a result a disproportionate amount of funding for circus flows through London; it is the largest market for corporate work and agency bookings – however, on the flip-side, London is a very expensive place to live, work, train and secure space – so the costs of producing circus and the costs of being a circus performer in London are much higher than the rest of the UK. In terms of circus education London is also strong because (as in common with other educational facilities) international students tend to prefer a metropolis when they travel to study. However, the rest of the UK hosts some exceptional circus schools and production companies. One of the strengths of circus is its ability to tour well, so circus can regularly be seen in towns and cities across the UK. Although London does a lot of circus by virtue of its size and its status as a ‘destination location’ – it ENCI
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would not be fair to name London (or anywhere) the ‘centre’ or ‘hub’ of circus – it is not stronger or better at circus, it is just a metropolis – with the scale and with all the benefits and drawbacks that brings. There are no ‘main centres’ or ‘main hubs’ of circus in the UK – indeed, the circus community aims to mainstream circus across the country. The UK circus sector has no ‘umbrella’ organisation that speaks for it and no regional organisations that represent it. The London-based organisation called ‘National Centre for Circus (NCCA)’ provides excellent circus training and delivers one of the UK’s only two circus degree programmes. Despite being established, knowledgeable, successful and generally very helpful they do not have a leadership mandate from the sector; they are funded by Arts Council England but do not have a budget to fund leadership work to support the sector. Sector promotion and representation is an expensive business and it is hard to deliver anything substantive, useful or enduring without core funding. It is more helpful to think of the UK circus sector as a set of networks (some permanent, some temporary) rather than isolate specific hubs or centres. Having said that there are areas where more circus happens and the networks are stronger – these are in Bristol, Belfast, Cardiff, Newcastle and Sheffield. Bristol is like London in that it has many opportunities and a large circus community, but the city is much smaller than London so competition is much higher. There is a great local scene in Bristol, for all of the arts, visible at a street level. The Circomedia, another excellent circus school has its home here; Bristol probably hosts and delivers the highest population of circus professionals per capita. Belfast has the longest established community circus scene in the UK. Many people regard it as the most developed location for community circus, based around Belfast Circus School, which is a community hub for children, youth, adults and professional artists. Cardiff, Newcastle and Sheffield are localities that are particularly strong – and could be seen as a ‘hub’ if you define hub as a regional centre of activity and core of people that work in partnership with its surrounding areas. Both Edinburgh and Birmingham have begun to develop their circus activity and are creating centres of activity and significant volumes of circus training and work. The key to developing circus in a specific area in the UK is the establishment of a physical creation/ practice space and a set of committed individuals who will work consistently in and around that locality to build networks, create partnerships, draw in funding, develop skills and produce paid work for artists. In the UK, networks of circus communities and professionals come together through projects, programmes and pieces of work; the closeness reduces when the work is ended but those involved remain connected through personal relationships. People who have previously worked together stay in touch and they also become informed about each other through newsletters, conferences and networking at shows and events. This rather unstructured model of development is common to all infant industries – it works as well as could be expected during a sectors early development. It is likely that over the decades and as the sector matures, more formal structures will be created to support circus – just as it has across the other art forms here in the UK. TALK ABOUT YOUTH CIRCUS IN YOUR COUNTRY There are about 70 places across the UK where young people can take regular classes in circus outside of the school hours and curriculum. There is a growing network and grass roots cooperation between these locations. Youth circus includes all ages up to 25, some groups are just younger children, some have a focus on only juggling and acrobatics, others offer a full ‘curriculum’ of all circus disciplines. The level and scale is varied. ‘CircusWorks’ is the UK’s network organisation for youth circus and was founded in 2012; it is a response to a user-lead desire for youth circus to be represented by youth circus projects on a UK-wide scale. Member circuses come from across the 4 nations of the UK – England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. UK Youth Circus is seen as important for a variety of reasons: it is good for children’s physical, creative and social development; it helps build the next generation of circus professionals; and practising circus allows one to understand just how hard it is – so early exposure to circus training helps build long-term audience numbers. Youth Circus is sometimes funded by local councils – but they generally have problems covering the whole costs, due to the more expensive nature of the activity as opposed to cheaper leisure activities. The cost of circus is generally an issue for most families – especially in the current economic environment. Finding funding for a ‘pop-up’ circus event for children is easier than getting the on-going work of a Youth Circus funded. However, unless you can get considerable support in terms of funding, free/subsidised space and volunteer support then providing a regular Youth Circus is not something that can easily: cover its costs; be delivered safely; be executed professionally. As such a lot of UK Youth Circus is delivered by circus professionals/companies committed to the development of circus and happy to work for no or little income.
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In Newcastle the youth circus programme offers some young people up to 10 hours of tuition and training per week and the curriculum includes training, devising, teaching and performances opportunities for the participants. The Youth Circuses in London offer a similar level and scale of tuition and although there are more of them, the population of London is so much larger – supporting the concept that both the appetite for circus and the people who can deliver it are more equally spread across the UK on a per capita basis than one might expect. TALK ABOUT COMMUNITY AND LEISURE CIRCUS IN YOUR COUNTRY In terms of Community and leisure Circus, most major towns and many universities have juggling clubs and venues where participants meet on a regular basis for the pursuit of circus as a leisure activity. Likewise many gyms, dance studios and fitness locations offer classes in aerial circus, acrobatics, pole, etcetera. There is a strong culture of annual gatherings amongst the community – particular note to Juggling Conventions, which often cater to a much wider demographic than the name suggests. The largest annual gathering is the British Juggling Convention, which takes place at a new location every year in about April. Other notable events include Broxford (Oxford, September), Durham (October), Belfast (February). However, circus in the UK is still in the very early days of carving itself a niche as an activity in the wider ‘leisure’ sector. TALK ABOUT CIRCUS WITHIN FORMALISED SCHOOLS IN YOUR COUNTRY We don’t know of any mainstream or private schools within the UK that have a permanent circus curriculum. Many offer circus as a semi-regular in school or after school session, and many take circus as a special event to add to their curriculum, but there are no major locations offering a permanent staple of circus pedagogy for primary or secondary students. The UK has many circus schools of varying size and with various learning options. The two established circus schools that offer recognised further education (degree level) in circus arts are NCCA (London) and Circomedia (Bristol). A BTEC qualification is being launched in Newcastle (Circus Central) and Birmingham (Circus Mash) in 2015, this is for age 16+ and is a recognised educational qualification. However, at the time of this report there is doubt over the future of the BTEC system within England. Short courses with a qualification are sometimes offered from Circo Kernow (Cornwall), Greentop (Sheffield), AirCraft Circus (London) and Belfast Community Circus (Belfast). TALK ABOUT CONTEMPORARY CIRCUS/CIRQUE NOUVEAU IN YOUR COUNTRY Contemporary Circus reached the UK with the French company Archaos in the 1980s, this brash modern take on circus included ‘in your face’ stunts with motorcycles and chainsaws and was set to a rock and roll soundtrack. It was controversial and used the propaganda of its publicity stunts’ to great use as it worked it’s way around the UK. At about this time, community circus began to develop with No Fit State circus (the founders who were all in part inspired by Archaos), Belfast Community Circus (who developed partly as a means of bringing together different factions within the Troubles of Northern Ireland), Suitcase Circus in Edinburgh (founder Reg Bolton inspired many across the world, and led to the education and set up of circus clubs, companies and artists in the UK, America and Australia), as well as many other companies that sadly no longer exist. These days, contemporary circus must have something like an equal following to classic circus, however it receives a lot more funding and exposure from established means. The distinction between contemporary and classic circus is now more blurred than ever – The Moscow State Circus has forever been a traditional circus, but these days their shows feature a storyline to link their spectacular displays of skill. Likwise, Giffords is an English touring circus that uses animals, live music and intern (NCCA) artists who perform spectacles, but they founded 10 years ago and perform theatrically lead shows such as an adaption of ‘War and Peace’. TALK ABOUT CLASSIC/TRADITIONAL CIRCUS IN YOUR COUNTRY Both traditional circus and contemporary circus thrive in the UK. However, they tend to attract different types of artists and audiences so there is less career ‘cross-over’ than one might imagine. Indeed, there is something of a friendly rivalry between the two groups. The Victoria & Albert Museum (V&A) has a good website page on the development of circus and explains some of the circuses, both the traditional circus and contemporary circus, that have shaped today’s circus (http:// www.vam.ac.uk/content/articles/v/victorian-circus/). Classic circus is now much less common than it was in the past. There are still many, many individual circuses touring in a traditional model, and this is still largely done on a family heritage model (see www.palaceofvariety.co.uk which has a great section on UK contemporary circus history)
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! Reported By: Katharine Ford – London Company: Hangar Arts Trust Role: CEO and co-founder Years within circus industry: 10
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Reported By: Steve Cousins – Newcastle Company: Let’s Circus / Circus Central Role: Event Programmer, Circus Artistic Director, Circus School founder Years within circus industry: 15
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