Building and Nurturing a Community of Valued Circus Professionals
At Galway Community Circus, one of our strategic goals to build a community of valued circus professionals. We deliver high quality professional development for artists, arts educators and other arts professionals at all stages of their careers. In 2023 we hosted 303 days of professional development largely supported by Erasmus+ funding.
With support of EU funding, we provide a professional development programme for artists, daily training and rehearsal space, production support, mentoring and access for practitioners to an Irish and international network of circus professionals.
Some of our artform development activities this year included:
- Circus Transformation 7, a 20-day training for Social Circus trainers run by the Caravan Circus Network, and Circus Transformation Advanced
- Two professional development workshops with trainers from Gravity & Other Myths and tight wire artist Fred Rush
- Daily training space for circus artists
- Mentoring and funding application support for emerging artists
Read more about some of our favourite projects below.
Circus Transformation 7 and Circus Transformation Advanced
Circus Transformation (CTF) programme is a training for trainers programme for Social Circus teachers to develop skills to use circus for social engagement and change. The programme is run by the Caravan Circus Network and is now on its 7th cycle. The CTF training programme brings together 10 organisations from the Caravan Network and over 20 participants for 4 week-long modules on various core elements of Social Circus training. Galway Community Circus sent two of our artists/tutors to participate in CTF 7 this year and delivered one of the 5-day training modules in Galway for an international group of circus educators.
Circus Transformation Advanced is a research project that works to develop, enhance and evaluate the Circus Transformation training programme for Social Circus teachers. The project aims to strengthen the network with partners from social and youth work, disseminate the knowledge gained in previous training programmes and enable active communication between the fields of circus arts, social and youth work. The project also evaluates the CTF training programme, updates the CTF Guidebook and forms a peer network and follow-up strategy for CTF alumni.
In April, we hosted a 5-day meeting in Galway for Circus Transformation Advanced with the Caravan Network and European circus school partners Sorin Sirkus, Altro Circo, Cirqueon and Cirkus Cirkor. Circus trainers, programme participants, coordinators and researchers all took part in an intense week of meetings, workshops, and research.
Professional Development Workshops
This year we hosted two professional development workshops with tight wire artist Fred Rush and trainers from Gravity & Other Myths.
Fred Rush is a young circus artist who came up through the youth circus community in Ireland and was a member at Galway Community Circus for four years. With the support of Galway Community Circus, Fred enrolled in the Academy of Circus and Performance Art at Fontys University in Tilburg, Netherlands. Fred came back to Ireland for the summer and taught tight wire workshops around Ireland, and we were very excited to have him back in Galway to share his knowledge with our members! You can read an interview with Fred Rush here.
Gravity & Other Myths were in Galway this summer to perform during the Galway International Arts Festival, and we were delighted to have a few trainers from the group run a masterclass at Galway Community Circus. Circus artists from around Ireland came to participate, with many skills learned and new friendships and connections made.
