Arterial

Branches of gum leaves fill the space, four performers in a ‘meeting place’ move within, swooping and swishing the leaves across the floor to the edges of the stage. While the audience is being seated, performer Dylan Singh steps out of the space gives random people a leaf requesting them to crush it and smell the lemon scent of the eucalyptus (a symbol of nature and of healing in an ancient culture).

Presented by the award-winning Na Djinang Circus, director Harley Mann, who founded the company in 2017, draws inspiration from his ancient ancestral roots. Born in Galagal Country Queensland, his troupe explore the intergenerational trauma, inherent interrelations, and instinctual trust within his culture. This is a First Nations people connection, sharing and telling story to provide knowledge with respect to Elders who offer guidance and protection.

The Arterial team have collaborated to create an innovative, challenging, and soulful experience for their audience, with careful orchestration and choreographed acrobatic drama exploring their own physicality and movement to build story, tension, and conflict.

The troupe of performers that also includes Jonathan Brown, Tamara Bouman, Maggie Church-Koop tumble on and off the stage connecting, touching, bonding, and intertwining their bodies. It is a joyful embracement and an expressive beginning of what will be a tumultuous story controlled by unforeseeable and apocalyptic forces such as nature’s climatic energies and / or the ongoing hardships of a brutal and cruel world. Maggie Church -Koop provides a gentle yet hazardous journey in her symbolic tree (aerial silks); she expresses a wild freedom, an innocence, as she bends and twists, caught and wound up in her search of adventure and discovery.

Arterial’s circus acrobatic tropes utilise strength and contortion; the trapeze illustrates a joyful experience, yet it provides a dark presence whereby we see both Jonathan Browne and Dylan Singh express near death experiences. Tamara Bouman, a symbol of guidance, healing, and endurance, provides a magical presence, whirling and bouncing off bodies, using her physicality to give strength and love. Together they all unite, bonding with trust.  This is a universal tale that crosses generations and countries across the world.

Danni Esposito (sound design) has created a muti-layered and textured sound mix that includes indigenous sounds, digeridoo, ambience, voices, singing and  violin/strings inspired by European Blues. Gina Gascoigne (Light design) gives mood, menace, and wonderful lighting simulations of nature.

Arterial is a sensational and powerful avant-garde acrobatic show that links people, Country, body, nature, and culture.

Flora Georgiou

Photographer: Darren Gill

Click here to read Flora's Q & A with Harley Mann.