Holly Treddenick is an aerial dancer with Femmes du Feu. She has worked with dance for her entire life, but in the past fifteen years she has been increasingly drawn to the challenge of aerial dance. “I am drawn to aerial because possibility becomes spatially infinite – the option to create in mid air, to create complex sets in multiple dimensions. I’m drawn to the physical challenge.”

Here are seven things to know about aerial dance:

  • Aerial work requires an extra level of physical strength that isn’t paramount in dance. “After many years of now working as an aerialist, I appreciate not having to always be on my feet. The physical impact is different than dance, and in many ways it is much healthier on my body.”
  • Aerial work can be so mesmerizing and beautiful – it’s classically the elegance of the circus. “It has an otherworldly magical visual sense.”
  • Rehearsal space suitable for aerial is extremely limited in Toronto. “Artists are always searching for new options, especially for artists who work integrated both in the air and on the floor. I’ve often had to create in a space that requires many adaptations to what the actual performance venue will offer.”
  • Sometimes venues are accessible and safe for aerial work, but people who run them are hesitant or completely resistant to hosting aerial. “Often this is just because the form is unknown to them.”
  • Aerial work always has the extra element of rigging. “Sometimes this is straightforward, but I am interested in playing with rigging configurations. This leads to more unique ways of working with apparatuses and has occasionally lead to the creation of new apparatuses. All this is exciting, but is also extremely time consuming and again, space specific.”
  • Aerial circus, as a contemporary art form, is new and still upcoming. “At the time when I began creating and producing work that was integrating both dance and aerial circus, or producing work that was more contemporary than traditional, it was very challenging to endorse and uphold my work in the contemporary performance communities. Now there are more and more circus artists producing work in contemporary formats, which helps the whole ecology of the community and genre.”
  • People are often surprised by the magic, beauty, strength and seeming danger of aerial dance.

At the upcoming CIRCUS SESSIONS 2016 at Harbourfront, an array of high-level professional circus artists from across Canada and the US will meet to create solo and group choreography, improvisation and new collaborations between artists who have met for the first time five days prior to the show.

The Harbourfront Centre Theatre will be transformed into a magical circus space with the audience all around rather than a traditional proscenium set up. “My prep work as the producer is to create the most optimal creative, supported and sacred space for these artists to experiment and play and be challenged,” says Treddenick. “The public showing is the outcome of this week long laboratory. So what can the audience expect to see? No one knows.”

Catch CIRCUS SESSIONS 2016 on Friday, May 20 and Saturday, May 21 at 8 p.m. at Harbourfront Centre Theatre as part of the Harbourfront’s NextSteps dance series.