Requiring 100% trust between the artists and the audience the breathtakingly beautiful circus experience Brave Space by the all-female Chicago-based circus company Aloft comes to The Lowry, Salford from Thursday 18th – Saturday 20th July.
Presented in the Lowry scene-dock, this unmissable event will offer audiences the chance to step behind the scenes into a rarely seen area of The Lowry building, whilst experiencing an immersive and innovative circus like never before.
Brave Space is a celebration of female strength and power and received 5-star reviews at the 2023 Edinburgh Fringe Festival. It is now touring Europe with just two stops in the UK.
Inspired by the idea of creating trusting communities in trying and dangerous times, Brave Space starts as a puddle of 250-yards of fabric on the floor, and, with the help of the audience, grows into a massive blanket fort – a world of hope that includes interdependent acts of aerial arts, acrobatics, juggling and balancing on 8 ft high poles. A show that is impossible to perform without an audience, each act in Brave Space is designed to physically draw spectators into the experience of putting oneself on the line for the safety and well-being of at-risk members of a community. Not passive viewers, the audience becomes a part of the show, sometimes helping to raise the tent, sometimes holding ropes that keep trapeze artists aloft, sometimes standing so close to the performers you can hear their hearts beating.
Circus Artist and Director Shayna Swanson says: “Brave Space was created as an antidote to the horrors of daily news cycle. It’s not a “safe space,” but, an immersive performance that requires the audience and artists to show up as their best selves, encouraging them to care of themselves and those around them.
“I wanted to create a show that felt like the opposite of The Handmaid’s Tale – something empowering. I wanted to create the world I want to live in, even if it only exists for an hour at a time,”
Brave Space will run at The Lowry, Salford from Thursday 18th – Saturday 20th July. For more information and tickets visit www.thelowry.com.