History
CIRCUS SOLARUS has been shaped by our talents and interests and the vision of the people who commission us. The original team was a group of around 10 or 12 visual artists and performers who met at community arts festivals and projects in the mid-1980’s. Some had learnt stiltwalking from Graeme Dunstan, who had worked with WELFARE STATE INTERNATIONAL in the UK. Others had studied at DRAMA ACTION or worked with Ronaldo Cameron’s THEATRE UNLIMITED. We had puppeteers, musicians, jugglers and drama graduates. Many had visual arts or sculpture skills.
We formed Circus Solarus in 1987 and began performing as a travelling Medieval style Arts and Crafts Fair in 1988. We created the performance and the Fairground and booked local artists and crafts people to sell their wares. We were dedicated to using our arts skills in community celebrations - performances, parades, and large environmental theatre using banners, flags, lanterns, giant puppets, costumes.
This eclectic mix of artforms still underpins everything we do: - drawings and sculptures become costumes; dreams turn into characters. A strange perambulating machine appears in one performance as a circus cart, then reappears in others as a percussion trolley or a dispensary pushed by the Doctors Solarus.
Every person who joins us influences our performances. We give preference to full time actors and artists and in this way Circus Solarus has supported many other arts professionals who are dedicated to their craft.
We were fortunate at key phases of our development to work with people who recognised our potential and were in positions to commission us to produce costumes, develop performances and work with community groups on large events. In particular Johnny Allen at NEWCASTLE CITY COUNCIL and later at DARLING HARBOUR: Sharon Thomas at DARLING HARBOUR, Gordon Beattie Head of Theatre Studies, UNIVERSITY OF WESTERN SYDNEY.
We also enjoyed creative partnerships with museums and galleries: the POWERHOUSE MUSEUM; CAMPBELLTOWN REGIONAL ARTS GALLERY; NATIONAL MARITIME MUSEUM and local festivals including SYDNEY FESTIVAL, BLACKTOWN CITY FESTIVAL and FISHERS GHOST FESTIVAL Campbelltown..
Circus Solarus developed into a flexible and responsive company, able to work quickly to a brief, theme to events and work in communities on a vast range of projects and across varied artforms. By the 1990’s street theatre had become more of a focus for us, yet we continued to work on Community Cultural Development projects, conduct imaginative children’s activities and workshops for parades and festival performances.
The last 5 years has taken us to festivals in the Middle East, developing street theatre performances on a huge range of themes, conducting children’s adventure games and producing pantomime shows.
Today, we are regularly called upon to produce and manage large scale festival projects, such as Alice Desert Festival Parade, SPIKEFEST parade and the VIVA LA GONG festival finale 2004. We welcome opportunities to collaborate with other individuals and communities.
Circus Solarus continues to explore the Theatre of Celebration.