Giving kids a soft landing is the aim of one circus school, reports Rachel Dugan.
Children may dream of joining in at the circus, but the line between audience and ring is clearly drawn. What if you could be part of that experience, without having to run away with a Fossetts convoy? The Galway Circus Project affords kids the opportunity to do just that. In Galway's Father Burke Park, the group's brightly coloured tent recently played host to a series of circus skills workshops as part of the city's alternative arts festival, Project '06.
"You just missed the human pyramid," says Karin Wimmer, the Bavarian-born occupational therapist who was one of the group's founders. Wimmer, and her alter-ego Pippa the Clown, came to Galway nine years ago. The purchase in 2004 of a van made them mobile, and for the past three seasons the Galway Circus Project has been working with groups across the county, as well as attending festivals all over the country.
Inside the tent, eight small faces are scrunched in concentration as they try to master every parent's nightmare, plate-spinning. In another corner, a group of pre-teens listens intently as a tutor demonstrates the art of devil sticks. The emphasis, Wimmer stresses, is not on skilfulness, but motivation and inclusion, and it is this which differentiates the Galway Circus Project from a regular circus school. "We work with children with special needs, and of many different nationalities," explains Wimmer. "The circus has always been an international forum. It's for everybody."
This year the Arts Council allocated funding to the Galway Circus Project, but she maintains that accessing funding can be difficult.
"It's been a tightrope-walking act for the past three years, and it will be for the next three," says Wimmer, who hires tutors and works with local gymnastic coaches. "I am reluctant to use only volunteers, as there is a lot of skill involved. Ben went to university for three years to do this," she says, gesturing to the young man with bleached hair tutoring the kids. Australian Ben Bryant, who attended the National Institute of Circus Arts in Melbourne, maintains that learning circus skills builds confidence, and can lure children away from the TV."If they spend €50 on a prop, that's so much better than a PlayStation game," he says.
Although it is currently geared at the eight- to 14-year-old bracket, Wimmer hopes to attract more adolescents next season. "It builds an awareness of the body, and gives it a value, and they are less drawn to alcohol and drug abuse." There is a rise in excitement levels for a session on the trapeze. It is erected on a frame belonging to Belfast-based Tumble Circus, who are in town for the week and more than willing to lend a hand. The trapeze is close to the ground, and an invitingly thick crash mat waits below. Nobody needs it. It's difficult not to marvel at the agility and strength of these pre-teens. According to Wimmer, however, Irish children are not as fit as they should be.
"Seventy per cent of the kids, when we meet them first, can't do a forward tumble," she says. "Some aren't just unfit, they are unhealthily unfit." Today's group are anything but, and hands shoot into the air when they are asked who wants a second go. It's definitely time to leave, before the urge to run away with the circus overpowers.
Galway Circus Project will be enrolling for workshops in September. www.galwaycircus.com