What do you think of when you think of the circus? Clowns, perhaps? A ringmaster, a lion-tamer, or someone performing daring feats on the trapeze? All those things were in our minds when we decided to go and visit Phare, the Cambodian Circus in Siem Reap. Did we see any clowns? No. Not a lion or a trapeze artist to be seen either. But what we did see was absolutely amazing. The group tours worldwide, so we don't want to give away too much of what we saw in case you go to see the same show (and we heartily recommend that you do!) But we'll try to give you a bit of a sense about the show, and the circus, and what made the night so great.
A circus with a mission
Phare circus first performed in 2013, but its roots stretch back to 1994, when nine young men set up a free arts school for Cambodian street children. The men had been refugees fleeing the Khmer Rouge, and in their refugee camp they'd discovered that art gave them a way to express, and release themselves from, the horrors they'd experienced. They wanted to provide that for as many others affected by the regime as they could.
The art school grew, but there were still children who wouldn't engage with what they were offering, but who also couldn't find a way to function in society. So the school expanded its repertoire to include circus skills. As the founder put it in the video we watched while everyone took their seats in the big top, Cambodian children love to run and jump and play. So circus skills were a more natural fit for a lot of them than sitting and drawing was!
Over time, a troupe of skilled circus performers graduated from the school - and the rest is history. Quite literally; the circus builds its shows around the history of Cambodia - a lot of it dealing with the recent genocide, but also more traditional stories. It's run as a social enterprise, and all the revenues they generate go into keeping the school running so that, as it always has, it can offer education to Cambodia's children for free. You can find out more about the wider initiative on their website here.
The show
The show we saw was called 'Sohka', named after the titular character and based on one of the founders of the school. Without giving too much away, Sohka is a young girl when the Khmer Rouge come to power. The show details how her and a small group of her friends are affected by the awful things they see, and follows Sohka's life after the regime and her efforts to establish the school to help the street children she sees.
It's a multimedia performance. In addition to the main acrobatic performers, there is an artist, who paints four pictures during the show while the acrobats are doing their thing, and a projector screen high above the action which occasionally show words designed to help the viewers make sense of what is going on in Khmer, French and English.
The music is also performed live by a duo who seem between them to be able to make as much noise as an entire orchestra! They had composed all the music themselves and flitted between instruments (some we recognised and some we didn't) with ease.
Our reaction
We loved the show on a few different levels. For one, the quality of the skills on display was outstanding. On the acrobatics side, they had three people balanced atop each other...
... and many more things that we unfortunately didn't capture on film as we were too gobsmacked to remember to pick up the camera! There was also some pretty impressive juggling, and a memorable moment where one man, stood on top of another, backflipped onto a tower of two men. It was just jaw-dropping. The painting was also incredible. Jon was particularly impressed with one painting that the artist did upside-down, only revealing at the last moment that it was a skull.
And, as we already mentioned, the music was fantastic, adding to the performance and making the drama unfolding on the stage that much more real.
We also loved the storytelling. The circus isn't where one normally expects a powerful story, but the narrative that they wove was incredibly moving. The joy at the beginning of the show contrasts perfectly with the horror at the rise of the Khmer Rouge; the actors had truly horrific masks that they wore whenever they were in the role of Khmer soldiers, and the show didn't shy away from the atrocities that were committed.
The different elements of the performance all wove together so well; it might sound like a challenge to get backflips into a show about genocide, but these guys managed it with ease. Especially powerful was the dream sequence where Sohka battles the nightmares she has of the regime long after it's gone. It's beautifully choreographed, at once visually engaging and giving a shocking sense of how the regime has violated Sohka's psyche. It's also a stunning display of skill; we've never seen someone bend backwards so their head is almost touching the floor - and hold that position with a grown man stood on their hips! At the end of the performance, we both felt a little wrung out from the intensity of what we'd seen - but all the richer for the experience.
After the show the performers mingled with everyone to take photos and talk about their work. Jon managed one photo with some of the performers as a memento of the experience. Throughout, it was great to see these young people so full of confidence and smiles, given that we knew a little of where they must have come from to be a part of the school. We've been hearing much about governmental corruption in Cambodia recently, and it seems that the government is doing precious little to help the people worst affected by the genocide put their lives back together. So it was heartwarming to see the efforts of an organisation like Phare, which aren't just charities but enterprises aiming to give the people they support a structure to improve their lives with.
All in all - if they're in town, go and watch! And save us a seat :)
J&g
A circus with a mission
Phare circus first performed in 2013, but its roots stretch back to 1994, when nine young men set up a free arts school for Cambodian street children. The men had been refugees fleeing the Khmer Rouge, and in their refugee camp they'd discovered that art gave them a way to express, and release themselves from, the horrors they'd experienced. They wanted to provide that for as many others affected by the regime as they could.
The art school grew, but there were still children who wouldn't engage with what they were offering, but who also couldn't find a way to function in society. So the school expanded its repertoire to include circus skills. As the founder put it in the video we watched while everyone took their seats in the big top, Cambodian children love to run and jump and play. So circus skills were a more natural fit for a lot of them than sitting and drawing was!
Over time, a troupe of skilled circus performers graduated from the school - and the rest is history. Quite literally; the circus builds its shows around the history of Cambodia - a lot of it dealing with the recent genocide, but also more traditional stories. It's run as a social enterprise, and all the revenues they generate go into keeping the school running so that, as it always has, it can offer education to Cambodia's children for free. You can find out more about the wider initiative on their website here.
The show
The show we saw was called 'Sohka', named after the titular character and based on one of the founders of the school. Without giving too much away, Sohka is a young girl when the Khmer Rouge come to power. The show details how her and a small group of her friends are affected by the awful things they see, and follows Sohka's life after the regime and her efforts to establish the school to help the street children she sees.
It's a multimedia performance. In addition to the main acrobatic performers, there is an artist, who paints four pictures during the show while the acrobats are doing their thing, and a projector screen high above the action which occasionally show words designed to help the viewers make sense of what is going on in Khmer, French and English.
 |
| You can just see him busy at work in the background there. |
Our reaction
We loved the show on a few different levels. For one, the quality of the skills on display was outstanding. On the acrobatics side, they had three people balanced atop each other...
... and many more things that we unfortunately didn't capture on film as we were too gobsmacked to remember to pick up the camera! There was also some pretty impressive juggling, and a memorable moment where one man, stood on top of another, backflipped onto a tower of two men. It was just jaw-dropping. The painting was also incredible. Jon was particularly impressed with one painting that the artist did upside-down, only revealing at the last moment that it was a skull.
And, as we already mentioned, the music was fantastic, adding to the performance and making the drama unfolding on the stage that much more real.
We also loved the storytelling. The circus isn't where one normally expects a powerful story, but the narrative that they wove was incredibly moving. The joy at the beginning of the show contrasts perfectly with the horror at the rise of the Khmer Rouge; the actors had truly horrific masks that they wore whenever they were in the role of Khmer soldiers, and the show didn't shy away from the atrocities that were committed.
The different elements of the performance all wove together so well; it might sound like a challenge to get backflips into a show about genocide, but these guys managed it with ease. Especially powerful was the dream sequence where Sohka battles the nightmares she has of the regime long after it's gone. It's beautifully choreographed, at once visually engaging and giving a shocking sense of how the regime has violated Sohka's psyche. It's also a stunning display of skill; we've never seen someone bend backwards so their head is almost touching the floor - and hold that position with a grown man stood on their hips! At the end of the performance, we both felt a little wrung out from the intensity of what we'd seen - but all the richer for the experience.
After the show the performers mingled with everyone to take photos and talk about their work. Jon managed one photo with some of the performers as a memento of the experience. Throughout, it was great to see these young people so full of confidence and smiles, given that we knew a little of where they must have come from to be a part of the school. We've been hearing much about governmental corruption in Cambodia recently, and it seems that the government is doing precious little to help the people worst affected by the genocide put their lives back together. So it was heartwarming to see the efforts of an organisation like Phare, which aren't just charities but enterprises aiming to give the people they support a structure to improve their lives with.
All in all - if they're in town, go and watch! And save us a seat :)
J&g
 |
| Seen here with two of the musicians on Jon's right, and two of the acrobats on his left. Georgia was manning the camera! |
No comments:
Post a Comment