#circa circus

Australian circus artist Jessica Connell trained at the National Institute of Circus Arts in Melbourne, having formerly been a member of the Flying Fruit Fly Circus in the twin cities of Albury-Wodonga, where she spent most of her childhood. She has performed all over Australia, and in 2009 contributed to A4 circus ensemble’s first production, Downpour. Two years later she joined leading Australian circus company Circa and undertook an eight-month season of Wunderkammer at the Chamäleon Theatre in Berlin, and a three-month tour of the Helpmann Award-winning show, Circa.

Her first new creation for the company was ‘S’ at the Brisbane Festival in September 2012, and she has since appeared in – and helped create – many of the company’s productions, including Opus and Il Ritorno. Now Jess returns to London – having performed in a season of Opus at the Barbican – to appear in the European premiere of Peepshow. It runs during the Underbelly Festival at the Southbank Centre in London from 27 June – 18 August. She chats to Liz Arratoon.

The Widow Stanton: How old were you when you started at the Flying Fruit Fly Circus? Jessica Connell: I started at around 13 or 14 in their professional training group. Before that I’d just dabbled in a few weekend classes and done a bit of dance, a bit of tennis, a bit of martial arts.

What made you choose to go there; were you sporty? I was always probably more creative than sporty. I had a big family and we were home-schooled for a little bit but my parents were quite art orientated. We did a lot of plays and a lot of art at home, which was really lovely. My sister pursued ballet and I got into that for a little bit and I did a little bit of gymnastics but I think I really missed the artistic side of ballet and things I’d been doing in my youth. So my father suggested trying out the circus because he’d had an affiliation with them when he was younger. So it was kind of the mesh of two worlds that I’d been playing with since I was quite young.

Is anyone else in your family a performer; your sister? No, my sister became the mother of four beautiful children. Much to my dismay no one has yet followed me. [Laughs] It’s always been my dream for one of my sisters to come onstage with me but my youngest sister, who’s still in high school, is pursuing music at the minute. She’s been in some young productions so maybe there’s still hope. 

When did you graduate from NICA? I actually didn’t graduate. I went there for a year. Kind of before going to NICA I had introduced myself to Circa and about halfway through, Yaron [Lifschitz, Circa’s artistic director] just got in contact with me and offered me some short contracts, but it wasn’t until he offered me a full-time contract that I left at the end of that first year.

Impressive, Jess! Circus-school dropout is what I call myself. [Laughs]

Not at all. Wonderful to be so good that you’re spirited away! But which aerial disciplines did you do there? Primarily swinging trapeze, but since joining Circa I’ve done static trapeze and I’ve slowly moved into the world of single point as well. I don’t do trapeze in Peepshow; we have another stunning trapeze artist.

How useful has it been to have an aerial and a ground-based discipline? It’s been really good. It definitely made me more versatile, which was fantastic. Hoops was something I kind of came into later and it was probably the key that made me more versatile as a performer, so in a show if an aerial can’t be rigged I have another skill to draw on. And as I get a little bit older, it’s also incredibly interesting how to use, not just the physical skill, but perhaps the performance skill or the physical exploration and try to translate them from one to the other. Hoops has this beautiful flow, as does a dance trapeze. However, to try and disrupt that flow both on a trapeze and a hula hoop has always been something that was really fun and interesting.  So they definitely made me more versatile but they also challenged me mentally as to how to approach those two disciplines.

And to keep both skills at the required level is quite something. Definitely.

So what had first attracted you to Circa? It’s different for everybody but coming from an artistic background – and while I absolutely love the physical side of circus – circus was such an exciting world for me, because I had started what I thought was a little bit late. The Flying Fruit Fly takes kids as young as eight and most of my friends had been there since they were that age, so starting at 14… they even made a note of: “You’re pretty old to be starting but you have the right mentality so come on in.” So coming into this world of people who can be physical within their own… means, like, I wasn’t forced to be flexible or forced to be strong or forced to be tiny; I was accepted for who I was and asked to explore that.

So that got me into circus and then in my first year I went to see Circa’s The Space Between in Melbourne – we would go on excursions to see other shows – and for me what I loved about the circus was amplified by Circa. I saw these three individuals on stage with unique and interesting, not just bodies, but mentalities and personalities and it really shone through to me, so, yeah, it just amplified what I was finding I already loved about circus and it really brought it to life. It expressed it on stage in a way I’d never seen; that honesty and beauty is what just drove my desire to work for them.

So, you approached them; what advice would you offer to someone wanting to get into the company? Definitely making yourself known and expressing an interest in why you like it. In all honestly I can’t even remember what I said to Yaron [laughs] but maybe I told him why I wanted to work for the company from definitely a young age, because I knew that one day I wanted to work for Circa or a similar company. The idea of working for a home company was pretty exciting. But I also  channelled my creative energy and what I trained in so my disciplines were honed in on that world, and even then I pursued swinging trapeze less and got more into static trapeze because I knew that Circa was a smaller touring company.

Let’s jump ahead a bit, how did you cope with doing the same thing every night for eight months in Berlin? And we’re about to do it again! There’s something really exciting about doing the same show for eight months, and what I’m most excited about and how I coped the first time was… there’s a level of precision and exploration that you can get into when you do the same thing every night that I could never get touring a show or doing multiple shows like we normally do. For a whole week I could experiment onstage with breath, or timing, or just micro things like eyeline, and those sorts of things that really make an act unique and precise.

Because in circus you have so much freedom, we do a trick roughly in this musical timing together, and then we get from A to B however we want. That freedom is incredibly liberating but I don’t think you always get that. In Circa we’re quite lucky and we do get that freedom, which keeps things alive and interesting and rich.

Circa’s schedule can be relentless. How do you protect yourself from injury? Making sure I’m physically ready before we go on tour is really important. I just try to be as strong and healthy as I can be and, when we’re on tour, relentlessly doing physio programmes and those sorts of things, ensuring that the parts of your body that are weaker – because everybody has weaknesses – are always being maintained or in check. And then massage and lots of saunas and swimming if possible. And also kind of being smart, like it is a big tour, be sensible.  

There are so many new Aussie circus companies coming up; is circus regarded as a new sport option for young people there now? Australia is obviously quite a young country and I’ve been watching circus change and develop there since I was little. We have influences from all around the world, like in Fruit Fly we had Chinese, French, Russian in the skills we learnt but I also think now especially I’m seeing Australia have its own voice in the circus world. We still draw from those inspirations but I feel in the last decade Australia is starting to find its own voice.

I think that’s drawing people in. It’s becoming more known, because it’s more ours. And because we’re touring Australia more and more as well, it’s just the awareness of circus as an option, and the more circuses pop up, the more they offer workshops or classes, or even just shows to spread the awareness. Even Circa, when I first joined, we toured very little in Australia. We’d have a small tour every year, but as the company’s grown I’ve spent more and more time in community outreach and Australian tours and I think other companies are using that too and it’s spreading the word.

What can you tell us about Peepshow? Peepshow is our new little baby, and has been pretty exciting and wonderful. It’s still very new and fresh trying to find the right words to describe it, but ultimately it’s about showing and about looking and about being looked at. For some people the name might make them think of something quite sexual, which it can be but it’s also about having the freedom to show and be looked at and take your own emotions or stories… as often in our work, we’re not really telling a story or even trying to tell anybody what to think, we’re merely showing them something and hoping that they will take their own story from that.

Which of your skills will you be using? Mostly I do group acrobatics and hula hoops. Interestingly, when I first joined the company, I was more of a middle and base, but now I’ve moved a little bit more into the flying world, so that’s really new and fun and fresh for me to evolve through the world of acrobatics. I’m also involved in a few kind of quirky less-physical acts, which is really fun.

I’ve seen Libby McDonnell’s wonderful sequinned costumes for Peepshow! Yes [laughs]. As well as doing the costumes, Libby is also assistant director so she’s been a powerhouse woman as always. What do you like about creating a show as an ensemble with Yaron? I often think we’re quite lucky. Sometimes Yaron does come in with a really strong idea but he allows that to form and grow depending on who is expressing his idea. That’s really wonderful for a physical performer, and then at the same time, he sometimes says: “Has anybody got any ideas?” And we have the freedom to try to bring something on to the stage.  It’s incredibly rewarding. And what’s really lovely is how the shows at Circa can influence one another, like I see so much of ’S’ in other shows but a better, stronger more developed version of the ideas we came up with when we made the show.

Do you enjoy travelling and life on the road? Yeah I do, definitely. There are always moments when you get a bit nostalgic, you miss home, Australia. And my family don’t travel very much so to see them it’s usually me flying home. So there are those parts of it but I’ve been doing it for so long, it’s very much a way of life. I have my suitcase and I do enjoy it. I love exploring and taking photos; travelling and photography and circus, I guess, really go hand in hand. At the minute I still really love the lifestyle. 

Is photography one of your hobbies away from circus? Yes, definitely. My friends used to call me The Hobby Queen, because I can’t sit still. I also sketch, which I did when I was younger with my family. I’m trying to learn guitar but I’m pretty terrible. I love cooking. I’m definitely Jack-of-all-trades. I don’t really specialise in anything else. Circus is probably my main drive.

Can you pick out the best bit of your career so far? There are probably a million amazing things but last year we went to a small circus community and maybe, having grown up in a circus community, it really resonated with me. We spent a week with these kids from Yak Yak Yak and Cycas Circus making a quick pop-up show for the festival they were in and yeah, it was in Cairns, so regional Australia, and circus kids making a show. I don’t know how, but this show came together. I’d probably only known the kids for a week, but I had not felt this sense of pride in a really long time. It kind of reminded me about why I love the circus and how it helped me as a young child. Probably that is my most recent wonderful experience I’ve had at work. It’s still sitting with me and still makes me really proud and happy to do what I do. 

Do you have any particular ambitions for the future? I’m not sure. I’m quite happy where I am; I really do love photography at the moment but I couldn’t see myself leaving the world I’m in now to just do photography. It’s so hard. As long as I’m in this world I’m happy and excited and I’m hoping the future will unfold… I’ll find myself becoming a circus photographer and director if I have the right skills, if I keep pushing myself and growing in this world, my next path will reveal itself to me.

Jess appears in Circa’s Peepshow during the Underbelly Festival at the Southbank Centre in London from 27 June – 18 August 2018.

Picture credits: Pedro Greig; Kurt Petersen; Chris Herzfeld For Peepshow tickets, click here Twitter: @CircaPresents @UnderbellyFest @southbankcentre   

Libby Mcdonnell graduated from the Queensland University of Technology in her home town of Brisbane with an associate degree in dance. She now works internationally as a designer, performer and choreographer and specialises in costuming for contemporary physical performance. Her credits for leading Australian circus company Circa include CIRCA, How Like an Angel, On Air, Wunderkammer, Beyond, Carnival of the Animals, Opus and The Return. She is also the resident choreographer with Blue Roo Theatre, a company specialising in making performance with adults who experience disability.

Libby has designed the costumes for Circa's production Closer, a special commission for the Udderbelly's purple cow, which runs at the Southbank Centre in London from 7 April – 12 June. She chats to Liz Arratoon, who has long admired her designs, about her interesting career path.

The Widow Stanton: Did you start out as a dancer? Libby Mcdonnell: I did dance. I had a little bit of a revelation recently when I was talking to another director and he asked me why I hadn't pursued my dance career. I realised – you know what? – I just don't think I was good enough. But it's not something that I'm sad about, I just think that the hunger and the drive and probably the capacity didn't align into that particular career path.

So you branched off? Yes. I got to the point where I was making independent work and I just couldn't reconcile or understand why I was using the particular form of dance to tell the story or to explain the emotion. As a maker and as a performer I really struggled with that disconnect, which is why I love being a part of making work at Circa because the work is so authentic and the language is really clear. For me as a performer I just never really found my way in.

You've got many talents but we're focusing on your costume work here. When and how did you start designing costumes? I started making things… the very first thing I ever made was on my mother's Husqvarna sewing machine and it was a scrunchie, because it was the early 90s. [Laughs] However, I’ve worn a lot of costumes and expressed myself through my clothing for as long as I can remember.

Professionally, it was in 2009 when I did my first official costume design for a choreographer called Gavin Webber. He had a collaboration with a rock band called Regurgitator and it was for QPAC, Queensland Performing Arts Centre’s  150th celebration. It was a pretty big and daunting first job for me working with quite high-profile national artists, and that's kind of how it started. I remember feeling really alive while I was doing it… and terrified, and then when I finished and got through it, I was like, 'Oh my goodness, I can't believe I made it through. What –was – that?'. And just feeling the adrenaline and things like that that I hadn't ever felt when I'd done anything else before. That was the moment when it clicked with me, physically and emotionally.

How had Gavin picked you? Did you know him? I did. Because I'd been pursuing this other career I didn't realise that costume design was a thing, to be honest. It was one of those moments where I was very fortunate. I had been doing a couple of secondments with a dance company called Dancenorth and at the time Gavin was the artistic director. Kate Harman, one of my dear friends – you know those friends you have a great creative connection with, you're always making things together – Kate was Gavin's partner. She was living in Freiburg working in a dance company and I had connected her and Gavin with a friend of mine who I thought would be an amazing designer for this particular production. She at the last minute fell through and Kate said to me: "Lib, I think you should do it." And I was like, 'What?!'. It was one of those moments I'll forever, ever, ever, ever, ever be thankful to both Kate and Gavin for, for recognising in me something that I didn't know.

So are you self-taught? I am self-taught. I've always drawn, I've always made things, I particularly loved more tactile artistic forms, such as lino printing or screen printing. I've always been drawn to making and sculpting things, particularly with my hands and I've always been visually wired. I'd been dancing all my life but out of grade 12 I decided that I really wanted to study architecture. I got accepted into this architecture degree and studied it for six months. I was like, 'I really like it, I love translating concepts into something but this isn't quite right'. Then I did my dance degree and that didn't feel quite right either.

Then when I had been working a little bit longer with Circa, I still felt fraudulent because I hadn't got that official piece of paper that said I'd done a fashion degree or something similar, so I just wanted to know that I was really able to do it and I applied to a fashion degree course at RMIT, which is arguably Australia's leading fashion design institution. I got accepted and went down to Melbourne, for a week! [Laughs] By this time I was middle way in a relationship with Yaron [Lifschitz, Circa's creative director] and all those things as well, so I started this study but I was like, 'The bit that I love most about this job is the translation of stories and ideas into the design; that's the bit I've done years of training for, through the start of an architecture degree, through my dance degree and through my subsequent work experience’. I feel I'm still learning and I think they'll always be techniques and craft that I will constantly want to continue working on; the translation into something and the interrogation of that, plus understanding the body and the way the body moves from the inside out. 

What are the main requirements for a Circa costume? I think I can answer this myself! [Laughs] Well, there are so many. You need to be able to move in it, [laughs]… Circa costumes need to be durable…

Yeah, I've got that one! … they need to have the right amount of grip versus slip. They need to cover the body in the right spots and expose the body in the right spots. One of the exciting challenges that I always love in particularly in ensemble-based design is trying to connect a group of people to look as though they are uniform while subtly tweaking each of their individual needs, whether that be apparatus or unique body shapes. So, all of them have the most fantastic, amazing, complex body shapes and the costumes must cater to all of those different types while supporting them as they need to.

Are there special new technological fabrics coming out specifically for circus? I'm still investigating the realm of the different technologies of fabric, weave and that kind of thing and one of the things that I've found works really well for us… like, when you see a button-up shirt on somebody it will always have a minimum of at least three per cent elastane stretch to it. Often it's an illusion, so it will look like a business shirt but it's really not and it's much more complex in structure. There is lots of fancy patterning and ellipse shapes that you can do in the under arms of jackets and things like that to allow for maximum reach while not lifting up the jacket. It's always finding the right fabric that gives the illusion and the weight of the thing that you need it to look like while still allowing for the movement, and sometimes it's a bit of a tussle between the pattern design and the fabric choice.

At what stage in the production process do you start working on the costumes? [Laughs] It depends. I'm always in the room from probably day one. I'll definitely spend a significant amount of time in the rehearsal room and I'll also spend a lot of pre-production time talking about ideas and concepts with Yaron. When the physical costumes get on to the bodies and into rehearsal varies so much. It depends how much lead time we've had for a project, and how quickly or late the show settles. Sometimes it's every other shifting sand that causes the costume or the lighting or the show itself to have to adjust, so it's really varied. At the moment we've got a show opening next week on Thursday and I'm hoping to have the costumes for our dress rehearsal this Friday. That's pretty late in the process! Sometimes it's great; sometimes the final little piece of the puzzle keeps it fresh for the artists and because we've worked together for a long time there's a lot of trust from them to me but it's not the most desirable position to be in for anyone. [Laughs]

How big is your team? I have an amazing coven of women that I work with, [laughs] based in Brisbane. I have Janie Grant, who is head of wardrobe or head of production and two pattern makers and cutters and one seamstress. They are an extraordinary group of people and again they've been working with Circa and me since 2010. They've got the right kind of energy, they get when I call up and say, 'So, Jaaanie, I much need 16 of these and I miiight not have the fabric yet and we might need them by Friday…', and she says: "Great, cool. Well, you know the drill, I need the fabric yesterday and come and see me." It's really amazing, really special.

What are the costumes for Closer like? The costume is a very contemporary silhouette, a very classic Circa approach to covering the body and exposing the body. We've used black mesh panels and black Supplex. The men are in trousers with exposed chests and the women are in probably my favourite leotard design that I've ever made, which just follows the curve of the body and exposes the body in really unusual and different ways. There's a lot of black power mesh. It's a really tough mesh; one of the most durable fabrics I've ever used. The black against their skin tone… the aim of it essentially was to bring you closer to the artists and to their form and their humanity. I just needed to support their bodies gently and still maintain that sophisticated edge that I think Circa costumes really have generally. And to have the contrast in the purple cow setting as well, so there's this very sophisticated look and aesthetic in an almost Spiegeltent scenario. I think that's a really beautiful contrast.

Does the fact that you're a performer yourself help you understand the needs of the costumes? I think so. From a technical point of view definitely and from the psychological point of view as well, you really know when an artist puts on a costume and it does the thing that it needs to do for them, like it unlocks something else and it might be as simple as a black leotard but it just connects with them and the material they have to perform and the way they have to perform in it. That for me is the bit that I'm constantly searching for, particularly with such contemporary and stripped-back looks it's really important that there's just that subtle performance connection. Yeah, I reckon having been a performer that probably you can kind of sense it. [Laughs] You can smell it!

Most of your costumes are very stylish and quite pared down, would you ever like to design for something more elaborate? Definitely! I have a desire to design for ballet. I particularly love contemporary ballet; I love the form and I love the potential and the possibilities.

Picture credits: Libby’s headshot, Elyssa Crooks. Production shots: Richard Davenport; Darren Thomas; Tristram Kenton

Read our interview with Closer artist Lauren Herley here

Closer runs during the Udderbelly Festival at the Southbank Centre in London from 7 April – 12 June

For tickets click here

Twitter: @CircaPresents @UdderbellyFest @southbankcentre

Tain Molendijk started as a gymnast on the Australian national team before switching to circus at 18 and being scouted by Cirque du Soleil. After touring Canada with its show Amaluna she joined the Ghent-based collective 15ft6, which was formed in 2103 and is made up of Brit Richard Fox, Frenchman Thomas Dechaufour and Belgian Jasper D’Hondt. A specialist on Russian bar, she also enjoys the less strenuous pursuits of crochet, craft and photography and – perhaps unusually for a 21-year-old – loves the company of the elderly.

Having performed at the Out There Festival in Great Yarmouth in 2014, Tain returns to the UK for the London debut of 15ft6 show Dynamite & Poetry, which runs during the Greenwich & Docklands International Festival on 27 and 28 June, and tours until March 2016. She chats to Liz Arratoon.

The Widow Stanton: Where are you from? You’ve got an interesting name. Tain Molendijk: I’m Australian but my mum’s Burmese and my dad’s Dutch.

What inspired you to switch from gymnastics to circus? I love training and I love doing acrobatics but I really didn’t like the competition side of it. I was sure that there was a way to keep doing acrobatics and to bring people joy doing it without the competitiveness. I found circus and that fitted exactly with what I wanted to do.

Did you see any particular troupe that inspired you? Australian circus is… wow, some of the best in the world now. Actually I didn’t know all that much about Australian circus then, unfortunately. So the first circus I saw when I was eight, which kind of changed everything was Cirque du Soleil’s show Alegria, which is a pretty typical thing when you’re my age. Up until the time I started circus professionally I hadn’t really seen something in Australia that caught my eye and I didn’t know about circus schools in Europe either. I knew about NICA in Australia but Cirque du Soleil seemed like the best thing for me to do.

So how did Cirque du Soleil find you? Did you audition? I’d quit gymnastics when I was 15 but when I finished high school I started doing circus for fun at a local circus school. Then when I decided to try for Cirque du Soleil I started training back at the gymnastics place where I’d trained before and I got scouted by them. My coach was in Montreal and she showed a friend who was an acrobatic casting person in Cirque du Soleil one of my videos and she picked me straight away.

That’s really impressive because a lot of people languish in their database and never get called. That’s such an accolade. I was very lucky! I think if I’d done the audition – because I was only 17 and still so shy and unsure of myself – I don’t think I would have gotten in. It was luck that at the time they were searching for what I had.

Could you do Russian bar by then? No, I only started Russian bar in mid-2013. It was the first time I’d ever done it. In 2011 I was selected to do an uneven-bars act in the show Amaluna [coming to London’s Royal Albert Hall in January 2016] so I started the creation of that in August 2011 as a gymnast in the house troupe.

How long did you stay with the company? I was contracted to stay two and a half years but I only ended up staying one and a half years because I found a different style of circus, contemporary circus in Europe that I really liked. I kind of discovered that Cirque du Soleil wasn’t quite for me. It was an amazing experience but I left them in March 2013 and came to Europe and kind of fell into working with the boys.

I was going to ask how you found the transition from competing to performing but as you didn’t like competing maybe it came naturally? Yes. Nothing feels as right as being onstage.

Were you always like that as a kid? No, not at all. I’m kind of shy when I’m not in front of an audience but when I have something I feel I can justify doing onstage I feel very comfortable doing it. The creation I did with Cirque du Soleil helped me overcome my shyness so much because the moment you get over that barrier of being too shy to improvise or act or do something else onstage life just becomes so much more fun.

So how did 15ft6 find you or did you find them? Is it OK if I tell the long story? Of course it is! I was with a boy in Australia who was a builder and when I left for Montreal he ended up coming to join me there. While he was there he was bored out of his brains because getting a visa to work in Canada was quite difficult so he started just training weights and stuff in the residence at Cirque du Soleil. There he met a boy who was on medical. He was in the show Zarkana but broke his leg. And they were Richard and Jasper, my bases. They started training together and got along really well and Jasper was looking for something new, because he didn’t want to do teeter board any more and I don’t know why he decided to choose a builder out of anyone, but him and Richard started working together. They went to Las Vegas and started training Russian bar under a Russian coach. Then they moved to Europe and started their own company with Thomas. So I’ve known them as friends for a long time and when I decide to leave my contract I just wanted to come and see them and get into the world of circus. At the time, it wasn’t quite working with the flyer they had so they decided not to work together anymore and I kind of fell into working with them.

I imagine you prefer the dynamics of a small troupe? Definitely.

Tell us about the show. Dynamite & Poetry is a show made by four very silly boys. [Laughs]

Four? Originally, yes, and then I came in and had to find my place as a girl in this very silly show. We have the intention of doing a fabulous show but as soon as we start everything just goes wrong… on purpose. I guess the show is just chaos and very… silly… humour. One of our main things was to not take ourselves too seriously because there are so many companies now that just take themselves so seriously and sometimes forget how fun circus is. We really have a licence to do whatever we want onstage and that’s also one of things that the boys had in mind when they created the show was do all the things they’ve always wanted to do onstage but never had the opportunity, so this show is a combination of very absurd things, like dressing up in a chicken costume and blowing things up with pirate bombs [laughs] and showing their bums onstage. [Laughs]

So there’s something literal about the title? It’s very literal. There’s dynamite and there’s poetry.

Russian bar is one my favourite disciplines. It’s so precise and exciting. How do you train for it? It’s a lot of trampoline.

But you have to land in that tiny little zone… The boys are very, very good at their job. [Laughs] The best thing is that we’ve known each other, one of them so well and the other one we’re such good friends that the trust is just there. I’ve never really thought of it as dangerous or anything cos I just trust that they’re going to be there.

Do you use pole-vault poles? Yes, the boys build the bars themselves. They bought three pole-vault poles and used silicon to stick them together and then put some padding on it.

What tip would you give someone thinking of taking it up? Ooh, I just say, ‘Try it’, because the beauty of this discipline is that it looks so much harder than it actually is. Oh, don’t tell us that! [Laughs] [Laughs] The principle is quite simple. My job is to do what I have to do in the air and the boys’ job is to catch me. It’s not like I have to search for this tiny little thing to come under my feet. That’s the thing. The hardest job is probably the bases’. As long as I do my acrobatics in the air well then it’s kind of up to them. [Laughs]

Do you enjoy taking risks? For sure I do because you’re always trying to achieve more difficult skills on the Russian bar. Also because we travel around doing summer festivals and different shows, the environment we perform in is always so different and that can be really scary… like if it’s really windy or the sun’s in my face or we’re performing on cobblestones, I’m always challenging myself in that way because there’s never a comfort zone. It’s not like we’re performing in the same place every day. When you have your pitch outdoors it’s so much more intimate with the audience, much more casual, more human, the performer and the audience. We prefer that. But we can perform the show inside. We just did an old glass factory in Meisenthal, France, that’s been converted into a cultural centre.

What are your plans after the tour? We’re always open to everything. We have our tour planned up until March next year. We do May until the end of September with Dynamite & Poetry, then Thomas leaves us for the winter and me and the two other boys go off to cabarets mostly in Germany with a Russian bar act called For David.

What’s it like being the only woman in the troupe? [Laughs] Er… the boys are so smelly, and they tease me all the time, they’re always making fun of me and annoy me so much but I absolutely love them. [Laughs] There are definitely benefits with working with all boys. You just say what you think and you just get things done, but I’ve never appreciated time with girls more than I do now. I seize every opportunity to hang out with my girlfriends. Being a female performer is quite difficult actually… to justify yourself onstage next to three boys can be quite a challenge.

You must have seen the women in Circa? They’re doing a lot for the cause of womankind. They’re wonderful. I feel exactly the same when I watch them. They make me feel really proud to be a woman onstage.

15ft6 appears for free at 14.50 and 17.20 on 27 June 2015 and at 13.50 and 16.20 on 28 June during the Greenwich & Docklands International Festival.

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I saw the most incredible circus (kind of) ground tonight. It was a group of six people who literally, had super human bodies. I have never seen this kind of strength in a person. There was one act where a woman had a man standing on her head, while she was still standing, balancing on a block of wood. I honestly feel like I can't even accurately describe or praise their performance because it is that good and it's just something you must see for yourself.