Viva Circus Festival at PUBLIKA, #KualaLumpur #VivaCircusFestival2014

I admire how some people are able to push their limits all in the name of entertainment. I used to love animal shows when I was a kid but now that I know how much torture the animals endure just to entertain humans, I stay away from such shows. I don't even look at zoos the same way anymore.

Now, human artistic performances are a whole different ball game. These artistes are mostly naturally talented or are groomed from young to hone their talents. Some discover their skills when already grown up.

With people now having such short attention spans, it's amazing that these talented people manage to capture the audience's attention and have them awestruck.

If you, like me, enjoy acrobatic performances and the like, you will be happy to know that Viva Circus Festival is in town.

Established in 2011 as ‘Collision Arts Asia’ Festival, it was rebranded as ‘Viva Circus Festival’ in 2012. Each year the festival gravitates it’s focus around a key theme, and for 2014 its key theme is ‘ART IS POWER.

Over the last three years the Viva Circus Festival has been the forerunner in introducing fusion and audacious new styles of performance and social outreach with at-risk communities. The festival includes championships, showcases and workshops.

Viva Circus Festival 2014, with internationally renowned activist and artist Jerry Snell as Artistic Director, has launched with the festival theme of ‘ART IS POWER’ comprising seven days of distinctive arts celebration which includes social circus workshops seeking to expand the opportunities of and teach valuable skills to marginalised youth, and public workshops seeking to raise funds for longer term social outreach programmes after the festivities.

“Art has the power to transform, to illuminate, to educate, inspire and motivate “ Harvey Fierstein

“Art is social change and can transform lives… art can be a revolution..art is our voice & soul, art is power” J.Snell

This year’s Viva Circus Festival ‘ART IS POWER’ features a feast of acrobatics, dance, music, new circus, physical theatre, visual art and debate from a wide range of national and international companies and artists. 25 performances, 18 workshops – some of which workshops are for marginalized youth from Everyone Has Hope, Fugee School KL, Yaysan Chow Kit and will take place across the week in Publika, MAP and Viva Vertical Stage KL. All performances in Publika outdoor square are free for the public to enjoy.

If you wished you could have run away and joined a circus when you were younger, there's no chance here (I don't think so, anyway!) BUT you can learn some skills such as learning to base, spot, and fly in partner acrobatics, learning the performance art of poi, learning to dance contemporarily, or with hoops or hip hop style or jazz or even pole dance, and a must do act in all circuses- learning to juggle, tumble and cartwheel.

Public workshops held in White Box and Black Box MAP are subject to donations or minimum fees to assist with raising funds for the Viva Circus Festival social outreach programme.

CLICK HERE FOR WORKSHOP DATES (WORKSHOPS START FROM 24 NOVEMBER 2014).

Some of the shows are :