Being born is like being pushed off a building that is so high, you can't see the bottom - but people whisper 'certain death.' Like being one of those goslings - in the David Attenbrough thing - except we won't learn to fly. Freefall is a high. It grips you tight, red-wristed in present tense, lets you feel nothing but sensation. Allows you to forget, at first, about the end. Falling is breath - taking, but you kind of get used to it. I fell into being - an accident born haphazard and screaming I keep falling through the net of years. On the way down (or up depending on your position) I grab on to things - people, ideas, a nice leather jacket, in the hope they'll slow me down. Though I know the extra weight, will betray me, I drag them with me for a while. I train my grip and can hold on really tight. And I hit things too, sometimes, people, ideas, holes. some cling, some don't. I joined the circus to learn to defy gravity but instead it taught me how to use it, fall better, and not to look down. And we're all falling together, different speeds, different heights, in every direction scared. Avoiding any jagged edges that - may break our fall too early, hurling rocks at each other to clear our own paths, or just to kill time. The seconds rush past ruffling our hair. And mostly when I pass others I smile (or else am told to cheer up), pretend I am not scared, make a joke about something sad, talk about the weather, make my excuses and slip away.

About Francesca Hyde

I am often taken for a 4 limbed, 1 headed, fleshy creature that works in circus and dabbles digits in new-magic, but in fact, there are more people in my body than that…

 

I am no

 

we are

 

a collective of mostly artists and layabouts who are loosely connected by a shared live/workspace called Francesca K Hyde. The space is built for circus but accommodates many events.

 

Francesca K Hyde is the legal entity where we meet and under which we operate

 

At the moment the core collective is made up of writer Benji-B, performance artist Shipley Maddocks, circus artist Tank, and project manager Fran, though in reality there are many more who come and go. We get together to try and make unsense of the world that produced us (and for which we were intended to reproduce).

 

We are also part of the circus collective Collectif and then…

 

And working with the research project The Circus Dialogues continued

 

Our current preoccupation is day dreaming about queer time machines and writing letters

 

I am often taken for a 4 limbed, 1 headed, fleshy creature that works in circus and dabbles digits in new-magic, but in fact, there are more people in my body than that…

 

 

About collectif and then...

 

 

Collectif and then… is a monster. It has many limbs, many eyes, many voices and many qualities which we don’t have the vocabulary for.

 

The monster has devoured artists, thinkers & mischief makers.

 

But don’t fear being eaten by the monster, the belly of the beast is a bright and bubbling place.

 

The monster has roots much like a network of mushrooms that have spread themselves wide across the world. It’s roots have become heavily entangled in the ropes of circus, but have also grown out into other realms such as fine art, theatre, dance and activism.

 

The core 3 artists in the belly of the beast are aerialists. They bounce around the body of the monster, glimpsing out it’s many eyes, delving deep in it’s roots, and bringing people in through the mouth.

 

They are big & strong and have beaming smiles! They opt for disgrace over grace, elephant over elegant and naughty over nice. They are proud that reviewers have noted their ‘ungainly’ style.

 

They are overambitious, delicious and nutritious.They try very hard at most things they set their minds to.

 

They are quite charming.

 

They are submerged in their work, occasionally emerge and lovingly converged.