Spéirial

A night of aerial arts at 6pm in St John’s Church, Ashe Street. Admission is free with a festival pass, or €10 for walk ups.

Four aerial artists and four different disciplines in the beautiful surrounds of St John’s Church in Ashe Street. This is an evening not to be missed! With host Elysia McMullen and performances by Jenny Tufts, Judenald M. Penders, Kate Dunne & Freddy Burrows.

Jenny Tufts on Aerial Hoop: Jenny is an American-born, Ireland-based performer, creator, and teacher of contemporary circus, known primarily for her choreographic innovation in the worlds of aerial hoop and spiral. While she specialises in spinning steel she’ll try anything twice, and identifies as an untrained but enthusiastic dancer. 

Jude Marcus Penders, Dance trapeze: Judenald M. Penders: Telling the tale of a Queer Irish experience, sharing a story of trauma, fear and hope. Jude is a performer, a creator, a commentator. Philosopher, poet, and musician. A living, feeling human – an Artist. They create moments – experiences for humans to contact their humanness. Whether a viewer applauds or not, so long as they felt or thought something more is the central point to Jude’s artistic creation. Their recent work revolves around the human body and more specifically how it continually carries every cry, every laugh and every bruise it has experience.   

Sean McIlraith: Sean McIlraith, born and raised in Cape Town, South Africa, discovered her love for circus in Ireland as a young adult. She trained at the Rogelio Rivel Escuela de Cirque in Barcelona and has since travelled across Ireland and beyond to teach, learn and perform. Sean’s passions lie in eccentric and dynamic movement, specialising in rope, silks, and solo/doubles movement & floorwork. She recently ventured into creating her own works, with “RED LINES” being her debut production created with Monika Palova at the Dublin Fringe. This was highly praised, earning nominations for Best Production and winning Best Lighting Design. Her work is deeply buried in nostalgia, melancholy, relationships, and inner dialogue. She aims to embrace the abstraction of movement to make works that create contemplation and space for the viewers.

Freddy Burrows on Straps: Freddy Burrows started circus 10 years ago in Galway Community Circus. He then studied in Codarts, Rotterdam, NL. Graduating in 2019 with a Bachelor’s degree in circus arts, specialising in floor acrobatics and aerial straps. Upon graduating Freddy has been performing in Ireland and abroad. Such as Luxembourg, Austria, The Netherlands and Spain. He made it to the semi final of Holland’s Got Talent. Over the past three years he has been a lead tutor in Galway Community Circus, spreading his love and knowledge for this non competitive extreme sport.