It's morning in the large premises on Enghavevej, where AFUK - the Academy for Unbridled Creativity - is located. In the high-ceilinged hall at the back of the building, students from the Circus and Performing Arts programme are getting ready. The training clothes are a kind of fixed uniform for the warm-up they organise for each other every morning. It's an important ritual and foundation that ensures the body is warm, strong and ready for the day's training and challenges.  

"The training involves a lot of repetitions and a lot of training to make the body strong and flexible," says Mikkel Hobitz, a circus artist and teacher at AFUK's Circus and Performing Arts programme. He instructs the students in an exercise where the students repeatedly do somersaults on the ground. The exercise is a basis for a more demanding trick, such as a somersault.

At the intersection of sport and art 

At the same time, two students hang from the bars on the back wall. They activate their abdominal muscles by lifting their legs towards their faces. The exercise looks like something that could be done in a fitness centre or gym class, but student Ronja Hestad notices a clear difference.  

The gymnastics training in Ronja Liv Hestad's childhood was characterised by a high degree of structure, and at competitions she was judged on a fixed point system. Her many years of gymnastics training will benefit her in the disciplines at AFUK, but circus also offers her new expressions: 

"I once reminded myself to stretch my feet in a handstand and my teacher asked: 'What if bending them is part of your creative expression? That creativity and freedom is a great way to use your body," says Ronja Liv Hestad, AFUK student and former elite gymnast.  

Ronja takes off from the ground as an instructor gives her a discreet push upwards. She grabs the trapeze and starts swinging back and forth. The instructor instructs her and tells her that the more momentum she has, the less strength she needs to swing up over the bar. The instructor stands next to the trapeze and watches Ronja with her eyes, ready to intervene and guide. 

Nærvær og ansvar for hinanden 

I den store sal runger lydene rytmisk fra trampolinernes fjedre og fra fødder, der lander hårdt på de bløde underlag. Undervisernes stemmer og instruktioner blander sig med snak og grin mellem de studerende, der er som baggrundsmusik til dagens træning.  

”Vi er så nærværende, når vi er her,” siger Inga Haarløv, elev på Cirkus og Scenekunst på AFUK. Underviserne støtter eleverne, men eleverne bliver også uddannet i at hjælpe hinanden i de fysisk krævende øvelser.    

”Jeg står hver dag ved siden af en, der skal lave et trick – det kunne være en salto – og jeg skal sikre mig, at jeg får flippet dem ordentligt, så de ikke lander på nakken,” siger Inga Haarløv.  

De fleste elever på AFUKs Cirkus og Scenekunstlinje er medlemmer hos Dansk Artist Forbund. De er herigennem dækket af forbundets forsikring, som i høj grad er relevant for de fysiske artister. Og det er tydeligt, at nærvær og sikkerhed er et særligt fokus i træningssalen. 

Den kontrollerede krop gør det umulige let 

At the end of the long mat is a soft mattress. Here, Mikkel Hobitz is ready to help the students with power jumps, and he occasionally demonstrates falling techniques and take-offs from the hard surface. All to ensure that the students learn to perform the exercises in a controlled manner.  

"Everything in circus is extremely controlled," says Mikkel Hobitz, who in addition to teaching at AFUK's Circus and Performing Arts programme is himself a performing circus artist. The controlled body can make the difficult and perhaps impossible look playfully easy. This is precisely the allure of circus, the risk that many circus disciplines overcome.  

"We humans understand risk very instinctively because we experience it all the time - when we move in traffic or when we pour boiling water," says Mikkel Hobitz, who himself experiences the special connection created with the audience in the physical disciplines when he performs. 

"And of course, if someone stands upside down on a six metre pole, we know it's high stakes." 

AFUK has 34 students in the Circus and Performing Arts programme every six months and is one of the few places in Denmark that offers a structured course in circus. The school serves as a stepping stone to further education and work in the circus for several circus artists. The Circus and Performing Arts programme accepts new students every six months. Find info here.  Next admissions workshop in November - sign up at afuk@afuk.dk

 

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Alberte Silberbrandt