Showing posts with label bassline circus. Show all posts
Showing posts with label bassline circus. Show all posts

8 May 2017

BoomTown Games


BoomTown Games

A bit about behind the scenes at the BoomTown Games!


Welcome to a bit about behind the scenes at the BoomTown Games

A special commission from Boomtown Festival, and supported by Arts Council England. The BoomTown Games was the second incarnation of circus theatre production 'Athletes of The Night' which is the creative brainchild of circus director Bex Anson and Contemporary Circus Company Bassline Circus.

The Boomtown games is a tale of gang rivalry and the battle for the top spot in a series of favela style 'street battles' The show was created and performed on a bespoke set which was built into the design of  'Barrio Loco' A large area that makes up one of 'BoomTown Festivals many zones. It was performed outside and all around audiences that were in the Barrio Loco arena.

The Bandits on set in Barrio Loco
The show featured some of the UK's most accomplished circus performers as well as starring Eva Lazarus as The Bandit Queen on team Bandit. Eva Lazarus is a Bristol based  rising star in hip hop music and we (us circus performer types) were all enormously excited to be working with her in the intimate process of making a show.

Eva Lazarus on the set in Barrio Loco

The Bassline Circus family have had a presence at many a BoomTown for nearly as far as i can remember. Where what started out as a local grown festival that predominately was a bit of a party with our mates from Bristol has grown over the years its been running into one of the most epic critically acclaimed mind blowing large-scale festival gatherings in the UK/worldwide... to put it simply quite possibly one of the greatest shows on earth!!!

BoomTown festival itself is a twisting sprawling city of surprises. Set design and build crews arrive months before the event begins to build the expansive happening. Turning fields into micro economies and other worlds born of the human imagination. Some of the larger venues in the boomtown city include an Aztec themed reggae stage in a natural amphitheatre basin called 'the lions den' that looks like some thing straight out of an Indiana Jones movie. Bang Hai Palace, an epic rave temple neighbouring Chinatown (does what it says on the tin). Sector 6, a post apocalyptic nuclear power station, and an old town complete with a life size pirate ship 'The jolly Dodger'. Plus too much more to mention - including many micro venues containing unexpected intimate theatrical immersive experiences for audiences to enjoy.

It's always exciting to be involved in BoomTown festival and this year I had the amusing role of Zip line Mistress for the production of the Boomtown Games. This job basically involved a lot of rigging and the designing of some flying systems to fly characters from the show out over the audiences and onto the stage where they would then battle for the approval of Comrade Jose (the leader of BoomTown)

It was the first time I had been away on a festival job with my little boy around. My Sister Holly came to look after Aaron as Cihan was also working with the fabulous Bullzini Family, hire wire walking funambulists, in another part of the site. We were also both needed for the show nights of the BoomTown Games. BoomTown isn't the most child friendly affair particularly in the area of the festival where we were working so, just before the event opened to the public, i moved my caravan into a cosy little spot in the children's area and that made the show dates much easier for us all.

Here is a showreel with a pretty accurate account of the show, otherwise enjoy some of my behind the scenes snaps, followed by a few from the shows Rx




Lovely Claire Crook
Me Holly and Aaron



Naughty Matt

The Set from my little perch





Lots of making and sewing 

Jo Moss as The Joker






Zephyr our Stage Manager and Saul our Head Rigger

Seren, Cihan and I




'Lil Rice
Aedin Walsh as Firebird with a BangHai Palace backdrop
Firebird on the Ziplines
Matt CP30 and Firebird rope battle
Eva Lazarus and the Bandits


3 July 2012

FUSION FESTIVAL.DE



Fusion Festival 2012 was one of the most exciting  events i have been a part of for ages! I loved every single bit of it! I loved it so much I didn't want to go home and forgot to take any pictures.

Fusion festival is based in east Germany. The festival is held on an old aircraft base, that is dotted with aircraft hangers, these become the amazing and unique venues in which the party takes place. Each venue was so different and so much love and attention had gone into the decor and the lighting etc. It really was quite epic. The festival is run by volunteers interested in community living/lifestyle and communist principals, activists and communities of artists. The ethics behind the organization of the event really shine through. Everybody is clearly working towards a common goal, which is to make something amazing happen! There is no emphasis on profiteering in any way from the event. Im not exactly sure where in east germany we were, the artists were taken care of so well we didn't have to do anything ourselves.  we were collected from the airport in shuttle cars on the way there and took a double decker bus to get back to Bristol. Throughout the festival crew members were able to purchase bottles of beer at the crew bar for 50cents, I cannot even begin to explain how great that was!!!

All in all It really brought it home to me, why the UK festival scene grew to become what it is now. what it represents to the people who attend the events and how it has lost it's way amidst becoming some kind of business for those that work it. Surely there is a way we can return to our roots and find that love of it once more.

When people are truely creative and give there all into a Project/event like this it really changes and affects the atmosphere of the place for the  guests who come to visit feel and become part of the love that made it happen, and that is very special!

For more information about fusion festival you can check them out HERE but for goodness sakes please go, especially if you have ever wanted/dreamed of going to burning man, then you should go here, it will be much less expensive and is just as awesome!

















http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1197/1260455667_f9c5588553.jpg

I was an artist at fusion with the Bassline Circus, Bassline is a company that specialise in creating Cbaraves (a crossover between a cabaret and a rave) The show is performed to a live set by resident music producer Alex Kopecky, the show is performed to bespoke visuals, there is also live MCs and vocalists that perform....for more about the Bassline family see HERE



http://www.basslinecircus.org/pics/graphics/logofront.jpg


We had a pretty exciting run up to our shows, we had a few problems with our tent and eventually the tent masters and the riggers had to make the extreemly difficult desicion that we would not be able to do the shows unless the king poles were swapped out for better ones (they had some severe frost damage) The tent was hired by fusion for us to manage, so the company turned up on tuesday and worked throught the night to take it down, swap out the poles and put it back up again.  Obviously this meant that though we were very close to being ready to open the venue, we had to take everything out of the tent and put everything back in again, leaving us considerably behind schedule to tech, rehearse, and run the show before opening to the public. However as usual we all pulled our weight and together we managed to do this amazing feat and still make a show!!! we should be very proud of ourselves for that... here are some pics of our tent up and down party.

Tent going down on Tuesday evening
King Poles get hoisted middle of tuesday night/wed morning
Canvas goes back up early wed morning.



 That was not the last of our tent dramas either, there were a couple of very exciting storms, where it was all hands on deck to secure the already slightly wobbly structure as best we could, all in all it made for a lot of extra adrenaline in and around the show.

In the end we of course we pulled off a brilliant show (under the extreme conditions) we always do pull through, that's what makes us really great, against all odds we do our best, and then we celebrate .... hard, because we deserve to!

Here are a couple of snaps of my act from the show.



and finally i'll add the few pictures that i took around site there aren't many but I was having too much fun to look through the lens x

Bassline Alex, the music maker

ALEX

best tech tower ever

Like these colors



Bassline tent with projection on it









BoomTown Games

BoomTown Games A bit about behind the scenes at the BoomTown Games! Welcome to a bit about behind the scenes at the BoomTown Game...