Tai Kwun Circus Plays 2022

LIFE Event No. 2

Tai Kwun Circus Plays 2022

Circus Playground

Ting-koo-ki Mad Skills Battle

Only Bones v1.0

Ho! Ho! Ho! Monkey King is Coming to Town

PLI

New Boom in Circus

Rock It! Unicycle

Lunchtime Circus Playground

LIFE Event No. 2

Circus Camp for Professionals

Date & Time

9 - 11 Dec, 2022 3pm - 3.30pm (10-11.12.2022)
6.30pm - 7pm (9-11.12.2022)

Location

Parade Ground

Price

Free of charge

General

“Gandini Juggling. Not just leaders in their field but trail blazers who have reinvented the relationship between contemporary theatre, dance and Circus” -- Lyn Gardner, renowned British critic

When juggling meets contemporary dance, you get a dialogue full of amazement and ingenuity.

Gandini Juggling, a pioneering juggling group from the UK and winner of the Total Theatre Award and Asian Arts Award at the 2017 Edinburgh Fringe Festival, will return to "Tai Kwun Circus Plays" this year after their stunning work SIGMA in 2018. This time, they present LIFE Event No. 2 – a customized outdoor show for Tai Kwun.

LIFE Event No. 2 takes excerpts from Smashed 2 and LIFE – the troupe's recently acclaimed works that paid tributes respectively to the greatest dance gurus of the 20th century, Pina Bausch and Merce Cunningham – and extends the selections to an outdoor show. Gandini Juggling breaks down the barriers of various art forms by masterly merging the abstractions and theatre elements of contemporary dance with acrobatics, blending free-flowing music with mind-blowing acrobatic skills, and fusing agile poetry with unique humour. Together with Jennifer Goggans of Merce Cunningham Dance Company, the energetic show is not-to-be-missed for dance lovers.

Produced By: Gandini Juggling (UK)
Choreogrpher and Director: Sean Gandini
Choreographer and Assistant Director: Kati Ylä-Hokkala
Rehearsal Master: Emma Lister
Performers: Erin O’toole, Benjamin Beaujard, Sean Gandini, Kati Ylä-Hokkala, Jose Triguero,  Yu-Hsien Wu, Emma Lister, Jennifer Goggans

 

 

Remarks

  • Performance Duration: 30 minutes
  • Suitable for all ages
  • Activities are subject to change without prior notice. Tai Kwun reserves the right to make the final decision regarding the arrangements.

About Gandini Juggling


Formed in 1992 by world-renowned jugglers Sean Gandini and Kati Ylä-Hokkala, Gandini Juggling continues to be at the vanguard of contemporary circus, reinventing and reinvigorating juggling for the 21st Century.

Gandini Juggling celebrates juggling in all its facets, exploring not just what juggling is, but what juggling can be. Currently an ever-evolving ensemble made up of a virtuosic core group of jugglers, they regularly expand to include up to 20 performers for specially commissioned events and performances. Ferociously prolific, they are constantly creating new works, which range from radical art/juggling fusions to accessible theatrical performances, from choreographic studies to commercially commissioned routines.

Their most celebrated piece Smashed, a show inspired by Pina Bausch premiered in 2010 and has toured around the world since then. They have recently premiered LIFE, a piece inspired by American choreographer Merce Cunningham. The company was a central part of the Metropolitan Opera House’s production of Akhnaten, which features 10 jugglers meticulously choreographed to Philip Glass’s enigmatic score. Gandini Juggling's journeys have always been counter current, an individual voice in the global circus scene, with quotidian risk-taking and fearless upturns.

www.gandinijuggling.com


Biography

Sean Gandini
Kati Ylä-Hokkala

Sean Gandini is one of the pioneers of contemporary juggling. Working as a performer, choreographer and director, he has, for over 25 years, pushed the boundaries of juggling as a discipline and as an art form.

Growing up in Havana, Cuba, Sean was fascinated by magic and mathematics. At the age of 16, he began juggling, prompting a life-long fascination with all aspects of the art form. Sean’s professional career began in the 1980s, where he regularly performed in London and toured with various theatre companies – including the pioneering Ra-Ra Zoo. In 1991, with Kati Ylä-Hokkala, he co-founded Gandini Juggling. Together they have been at the forefront of experiments into what juggling is and what juggling can be.

Sean has created diverse array of shows, including the playful Sweet Life, the fiendishly complex celebration of the London Olympics Twenty/Twenty, and their smash hit, the darkly humorous and theatrical homage to Pina Bausch Smashed. The latest work of the Company is LIFE, a work inspired by Merce Cunningham’s works and with the support of Cunningham Trust.

Kati Ylä-Hokkala is one of her generation’s iconic jugglers. As the co-founder of Gandini Juggling, she has built a reputation not only as a highly-skilled technical juggler, but is also renowned as one of the leading innovators in dance-juggling.

Kati’s professional career began in the 1990’s, when she performed with the influential Ra-Ra Zoo. In 1991, with Sean, she co-founded Gandini Juggling. Since then she has been instrumental in the company’s experiments into the possibilities of juggling, including working to create unique “two-person sharing” juggling patterns.

A former rhythmic gymnast, Kati’s distinctive ability to combine movement with extremely complex coordination is second-to-none. In this she has crafted an intimate and extensive knowledge of the relationship between dance and juggling. Kati has performed in all of Gandini Juggling’s works since 1991, encompassing over 2,500 shows around the world.