So here we are: 2021. In general the start of a new year is a quieter period for us, usually having followed a very eventful summer and Christmas season. Although we haven’t been as busy as usual throughout 2020, we are lucky enough to still be working on some exciting projects: commissioning a new Big Top Tent, planning a new circus theatre show for summer 2021 and putting together a new hybrid performance/digital show with Extraordinary Bodies. Hopefully we will be able to bring these to life and share with audiences later this year.
These first few months of the year are where we have time to spend on planning, researching and rehearsing. It’s an exciting time – creating and shaping shows that have until now only been ideas and notions. One magical aspect of this is creating storyboards to illustrate the work. Transforming thoughts and ideas into sharable visuals makes it all very real and finally gives you something tangible to work with.
Artists are invited into our discussions and given an insight in to what we want to create. They then produce detailed and realistic drawings of the event or show – revealing how it might look and feel. Not only does this help with sharing our vision, it also helps highlight what might or might not work in practice. It is a vital stage in the creative process.
We’ve been lucky to work with some brilliant artists over the years who have truly brought our ideas to life, and thought it was high time we shed some light on them and the works of art they create…
Sara Corbett’s vision for our Harmonic Show, commissioned to celebrate the opening of Royal Botanical Gardens Kew’s newly refurbished Temperate House. 
Julian Bracey’s sketch for the Svengali Ringmaster at Paisley Hallowe’en Festival 2019, and the puppet created from this by Handmade Parade
(photo by Kieran Chambers)
Series of drawings by Flo Fitzgerald depicting our show Portolan, created for the finale the of Sunderland Tall Ships Races 2018 
A digital storyboard created by Howie Bailey during research and development for our Eclipse crane show 
Jay Clarke’s imaginings for ‘Wheel of Energy’, a large scale kinetic sculpture and live performance created for Expo 2017 in Kazakhstan 
Drawings depicting the fire torch finale held in Weymouth where 2000 people waded into the sea as part of the Battle for the Winds ceremony for the Olympics in 2012.