It was Saturday morning and Jay Nunns, the artistic director of Vancouver’s first circus festival, took a rare, spare moment to sit in the stands of the PNE Garden Auditorium.
The 74-year-old concrete building with its wooden floors, curved roof, and worn plush seating hasn’t seen too many modern changes; it probably did not look that much different when Pink Floyd and Stevie Wonder played here decades ago.
Minus, of course, the trapeze set-up, aerial silk ribbons dangling from the ceiling, and the stacks of blue gymnastic mats as it is now the regular home of circus arts centre CircusWest, as well as the four-day long CircusFest that wrapped this past Sunday.
“Circus is the blending of many worlds. It’s akin to physical musical theatre where you can tell stories, have strong narratives through performance. Like last night’s ‘The New Conformity’ which was a show about the regimentation of society, breaking free and finding acceptance in that,” Nunn said. “This was a juggling show! And it was brilliant!”
While Nunns spoke, he watched a group on the floor learning hula-hooping from Ariel Amara. Across the auditorium, others were putting their upper body strength to the limit in Colleen Yuen’s aerial silk class. They were just two of several workshops offered to the public during CircusFest, at a bargain price of $10 each, testament to the organization’s good-natured accessibility.
CircusFest’s catchphrase is “Inspire. Engage. Celebrate.” Nunns said the people behind the festival, which includes director Allison Collins, want to let Vancouver — as well as other places far and wide — know just what kind of talent is here through its various performances, workshops, and sideshows.
“We need to raise our voice as a circus community and that’s why we’re doing the festival,” said Nunns. “We have a distinct voice on the West Coast and we want to let people know we are viable, competitive, and we do quality work.”
Canadian entertainment company Cirque du Soleil lists Vancouver as one of the cities that sells out the quickest in terms of ticket sales for its shows which further proves Nunn’s point there’s a local appetite for the circus arts. Canada Council recognized contemporary circus arts as a fundable discipline in recent years, which moves the show far away from its roots from long ago of big top tents under which tigers were sadly made to jump through rings of fire.
“There is that fringe element to it, but maybe only for people that are older. With 25-year-olds, the only thing they know is the quality of entertainment that is the Cirque du Soleil.
They were not exposed to three ring, animal circuses. Which, in Canada, is not a huge draw,” said Nunns. “This is called new circus and it focuses on potential, drama, tension, excitement, human potential. It’s very European. In France, it’s like what hockey is to Canada.”
Circus started in Vancouver 30 years ago when an Australian circus performed at the Vancouver Children’s Festival. A young girl was at the show with her mother and asked why Vancouver didn’t have a circus for kids. That mother, Jacqua Pratt, started Cirkids in 1985 which eventually grew into CircusWest.
Nunns was an athletic kid so being pushed towards sports such as football seemed to be a natural path — at first. “I played soccer, baseball and while it appealed to me at a fun level, it didn’t stimulate my artistic side.”
But the circus did (a 13-year-old Nunns was part of the first group of kids to join Cirkids). And, a year later, so did world fair Expo 86.
“I spent my time there just following around the street performers — that was my college, asking questions. The Ontario Pavilion? Oh, great,” he said. “No, my stamp was watching every street performer and watching informal workshops on the street.
“Now that I think about it, that was huge for me. That was kind of the impetus for doing this — hopefully this inspires the next generation. Some kid will remember going to CircusWest and then…”
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