Creative Access in Circus
Hosted by Amy Amantea
Can the sound of the body enhance the visual experience for audiences who are blind or low vision?
When the sound of a moving body: spinning, inverting and more, is combined with a descriptive narrative, can it enhance the experience of circus arts? Using technology, live music, the team from Vibrafusion Labs and Andrew Heule, Erin Ball and Maxime Beauregard will join us to share “the early days” of experimentation and play.
Describer Cafe livestreams are free to attend. Register here to receive links and reminders to all upcoming cafes.
Guest Bios
Erin Ball (ze/zir) is a white, neurodivergent, double below knee amputee. Erin is a circus artist based near Katarokwi/Kingston, Ontario and the artistic director of Kingston Circus Arts. Erin achieved Disability membership in 2014 and took a year off. Ze then began the process of un-learning ableism and internalized ableism and its many intersections, as well as re-learning circus arts and delving into the world of creative accessibility. Erin created a course to strive to welcome the Mad, Deaf, Neurodivergent, Chronically Ill, and Disability community into the realm of circus (and movement-based) arts as artists, audiences, etc. Erin travels internationally to perform, teach, and collaborate. Erin has been a movement-based artist for 15 years, and has co-produced and co-choreographed shows with numerous artists and access providers.
Maxime Beauregard (they/them) is a performer, choreographer, producer, accessibility consultant, and workshop facilitator. They are a passionate advocate for Disability-led art and accessibility, striving to create inclusive spaces and representation. Erin and Maxime travel internationally to share their knowledge, teach workshops, and captivate audiences with their performances. Their work strives to reach as many people as possible, bringing diverse perspectives and innovative artistry to the global stage.
Andrew Heule (he/him) is a limb-different amputee, musician, performer, educator, emerging writer and mushroom enthusiast, originally from Treaty 6 territory/amiskwacîwâskahikan/Edmonton, now based in tkaronto/Toronto. He has been a drummer for over 20 years, supporting many different artists and touring around the world. The deeply inaccessible nature of the music industry has driven Andrew to find alternative ways to work and create in the music sector. His work now explores finding new ways of creating and performing that honour disability, and placing care and access needs at the centre of the creative process and in every collaboration. Andrew is currently working on an audio-visual installation called Celebrating Our Ways Of Moving: Challenging Bipedal Normativity, which seeks to document and celebrate the different ways that lower-limb amputees move through the world. He also creates soundscapes / ambient music for circus/aerial performances, and is exploring cymatics as a way to make music and sound accessible to Blind/Low-Vision community.
