Le Sacré.

The Australian Ballet School and the National Institute of Circus Arts (NICA) join forces in their inaugural collaboration, Le Sacré.

The striking pink, blue and yellow silks strung high at the back of the stage give a glimpse of the dynamic performance to come. One by one the cast enters the stage, lying close together to form a human mound. The mound starts to twitch. The lights finally dim. Black-and-gold clad performers enter the stage, a stark contrast to the fluorescent mound. From there it is a flurry of movement, with animalistic strength and suppleness.

The cast is highly professional, working well together and recovering quickly after a minor mishap. It is difficult for the most part to differentiate the 18 second year NICA students from the 26 advanced diploma-level ballet dancers from the Australian Ballet School. The performance also allows them plenty of opportunity to show off their expertise. The audience is treated to a plethora of circus acts including tissu, Chinese pole andtipping rings. The ballet included pointe and partner work.

I had hoped there would be greater diversity amongst the ranks of Australia’s emerging performing artists, but it was not the case. Awareness that performing arts lack diversity is growing, however solutions still elude us. Indeed, being able to study performing arts is a privilege not many can afford, and both schools are making efforts to extend scholarships to disadvantaged people. Evidently, however, more needs to be done to improve the representation of all Australians in performing arts.

Ballet can be just as spectacular as circus, but in this case ballet was over-shadowed. The choreography should have been stronger to show the power of ballet. The most balanced scene just before the end of Act 1 had the male ballet dancers doing grand allegro, leaping amongst the circus performers, creating just as much excitement on the stage as the aerial ring soloists dangling above them. Even then, however, the female ballet dancers were given little to do but prance about doing fluffy choreography that didn’t do their talent or art form justice.

That said, the collaboration is a worthy and brilliant exploration of the cross-roads between two graceful, athletic performing arts. With experience, a more equal representation could be made and boundaries pushed even further. I hope such partnerships continued to be developed.

Sophia Dickinson

Photographer: Aaron Walker.