NoFit State circus bring their stunning and captivating show Bianco to Limerick Culture Factory this week. Limerick Post spoke to its creator Firenza Guidi.
BIANCO by NoFit State contemporary circus is the next headline event at the Culture Factory for Limerick’s City of Culture year. Bianco is a performance combining traditional circus skills, high wire, trapeze and aerial straps with live music and theatre to create a wonderful experience for grown ups and children of 7 years and older.
This is a circus with no ringmaster, no clowns and no animals. Directed by Firenza Guidi, Bianco was inspired by the book The Elephant’s Journey by José Saramago, a tale of adventure and friendship. Limerick Post listened to Firenza last week to get her insights into what makes Bianco such a compelling and emotionally engaging performance.
Milan-born Firenza Guidi is writer-director and performance creator. Trained as a performer/singer with international masters including Dario Fo, Philippe Gaulier, Ludwig Flaszen, Enrique Pardo, Ida Kelarova and as an actress at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama, Cardiff where she regularly directs and teaches. She is Artistic Director of ELAN founded with David Murray in 1989. She has spent the last fifteen years directing and creating performances in Wales, Europe, USA and India.
What is Bianco?
“Putting together a show like this is like painting with human beings. When people ask me, What is the narrative? I say fasten your seat belts and just fly.”
What can the audience expect?
“For Bianco I very much wanted the audience to own the centre stage. If you are in the centre, what you have to do is 360 degree turns to see the show. Carnally the audience are very close to the performers. They don’t know where the next thing is coming from. Every single bit of the show is revealed in front of your eyes, which is magical. For every single bit of rigging, there are no motors. The performers are counterweights. If there is one human coming down then there is another going up.
The music is an integral part of the show?
“If Bianco the show is the machinery then the music is the fuel. The music creates a different quality in each scene. It is the heartbeat of Bianco, it goes from a really simple voice with just a piano to tribal drumming to rock. It really takes you on a journey from east to west from Gregorian chanting to a New York underground club.
What do you look for in a circus performer?
“I really like a circus performer that has a thinking quality. Very often it is about training, training, training the body the muscles to be an aerialist. I want a performer to be time based, to be filmic, to be Quentin Tarantino-esque. You are not coming to see green leotards and feathers where everyone dresses the same. You are coming to see performers who are first of all human beings.”
Sum up Bianco?
“I tried to create a piece that looks improvised but it is not. There is an edge and an honesty to the performance. What you see is what you get. It is weaving the ordinary into the extraordinary. Bianco is energising and empowering and the audience will go out from the show Alive.”
