Flyweight Chains

[tieke]

OK, here is me on Flyweight Chains: the aerial dance apparatus that I've spent the last 6 months developing in semi-secret.

One Sunday, around 6 months ago, I was watching happyinmotion counterweight fuvenusrs up and down, and I started wondering what would happen if an aerialist was counterweighted by their apparatus, rather than by a person. The internet didn't seem

Comments

[ferrouswheel]

Super cool... and looks like a hell of a lot of fun!

[tieke]

Thanks!

It is fun - as long as your definition of fun includes squashing your internal organs with a very tight harness.

[tieke]

This is true. I may be rivalling you for the "crotch of steel" title.

Also, I now know that an ingrown hair in exactly the wrong place brings a whole new dimension to pain tolerance ... and swearing.

[tieke]

And back at ya!

If we can figure a safe way to belay the chains in, we can put you on the apparatus when you're here next. No guarantees - belaying them out is easy, in is harder, but this is something I want to work out at some stage anyway, so let's see what we can do.

[wildilocks]

I would like to watch, because I thought it looked hella fun too, but I'm just not fit enough for This Sort of Thing.

[danjite]

Didn't have enough time to deliver all the compliments on Satyrday, but let me add another: You inhabited and performed your facial expressions really well during this piece- great work.

[tieke]

Gosh, thank-you! I felt that I had some difficulty being fully present during the piece - partly due to it being the first time in front of an audience (scary!), and partly due to the lighting-related difficulties. So that's a really lovely comment to get, many thanks.

Circus in chains

[edm]

Thank you (and Patrick) for taking the time to make a video of this to post, so that those of us who couldn't make it could enjoy it too. It looked like an amazing performance, and I'm really impressed that not only did you do it, but it appears you have invented a new performance rig in the process!

I agree with ferrouswheel that it does look like a fun rig to dance in. Give or take the corset nature of the harness.

Ewen

Re: Circus in chains

[tieke]

Hi Ewen, thanks for your lovely comment.

The video thing is interesting - I am coming to think that I may be more interested in videoing performances and putting them on the web, than in performing live. Which raises a whole bunch of interesting issues around how I go about this work in future.

And yes - it is probably as much a concept as an apparatus - and there are a number of different ways that you could work with the concept, in addition to the way that I did it with this piece.

Re: Circus in chains

[thatgirljj]

I wonder if you could use it with an aerial strap rig on one side and the chains as counterweight? Because straps seem to me to be the natural next step beyond a harness... or at least they seem that way with your style of performing.

(Found you through Ms. tatjna. Promoing your youtube video on Facebook to a bunch of my aerial geek friends here in LA.)

Re: Circus in chains

[tieke]

Hiya, yep in theory that would be one possibility, but I wouldn't advise it, as I think it would be very dangerous. The problem would be if you were half way up, with one hand/leg holding the chains, the other holding the roundsling, and then, for a moment, you forgot to hold onto the sling. Whereupon, you would plunge to the ground, and the chains would fall on top of you. That said, you could probably make it safeish with a harness/lunge clipped in at the same point as the sling, as a backup, but I would be very cautious about using any apparatus on the aerialist side that the aerialist is free to let go of.

And hi - I have noticed you as an aerialist on Tats' blog)! Thanks heaps for the promo - I'm really keen to get this idea out there, to both perform and teach it, and to see where the concept goes.