News

Does Australian circus have a superpower?

From an innate spirit of innovation to kindness and community engagement, circus arts have a superpower all their own.

28 Nov 2023 22:58

Richard Watts

Circus. Image is two acrobats, one doing a one-handed handstand on a row of footlights and the other crouching and helping the first to balance.

Performing Arts

A sequence from ‘Apricity’ by Casus. Photo: Rob Blackburn.

‘Circus is an art form in which there is no end to the possibilities … and I think one of the key reasons for this is that circus – as we think of it in this community, as it’s programmed in mainstage festivals – still is very much perceived by audiences as new and exciting,’ said Antonella Casella, a founding member of Brisbane’s Rock’n’Roll Circus (now Circa), ex-street performer and long-term creative practitioner and sector advocate, who now lectures in Circus History at Melbourne’s National Institute of Circus Arts (NICA).

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Richard Watts

Richard Watts OAM is ArtsHub's National Performing Arts Editor; he also presents the weekly program SmartArts on Three Triple R FM. Richard is a life member of the Melbourne Queer Film Festival, a Melbourne Fringe Festival Living Legend, and was awarded the Sidney Myer Performing Arts Awards' Facilitator's Prize in 2020. In 2021 he received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Green Room Awards Association. Most recently, Richard received a Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM) in June 2024. Follow him on Twitter: @richardthewatts