LOFT
CIRCUS
ARTS
By Shayna Swanson
THE
VISION
When I was looking into circus schools, back when dinosaurs roamed the
earth, there were very few educational opportunities in the United States.
One could go to San Francisco or go back to bed, basically. I chose a third
option, which was in England. When I returned to the US, I got my first job with
a Chicago company, the Midnight Circus, and started teaching some classes
and private lessons out of the space they rented from a Wu Shu School. Those
were really relaxed and fun years ... staying out late, sleeping later and biking
in to train with my best friends for eight hours. It was living the dream, really,
but I had a show inside my head, gnawing at me.
So, in what would become Aloft ’s modus operandi, I just did it, with little
advance planning and $1000 in my pocket. There were almost no other
aerialists in Chicago at the time because there were no circus or aerial
schools—this was before the aerial craze took hold in the states. So, I had
an audition and invited dancers, gymnasts, and theater people. I took all the
theater people because they could tell a story, and I knew that would translate
into their bodies with the right training. I trained them for several months and
then created the show Rolling Blackouts, which I still think is my best show
yet. I had only intended to do this one show, but then we got contacted for
some gigs and I decided to keep going with this group of people and we took
the name “Aloft Aerial Dance” (which was changed to Aloft Circus Arts years
later).
When we outgrew renting from Midnight, we found our own space in an old
autobody shop. We pressure washed the walls, had a rigging company come
in and install some super solid rigging, bought an old spring floor and opened
our doors. People didn’t really come. It took a special breed of badass to even
find the place, which was located in an alley that was down another alley. You
had to walk past dumpsters and drug dealers to get in. Rats would die under
our spring floor and we’d have to tear it up and retrieve their rotting bodies. It
was… not ideal. But it was home and we made several great shows there. Not
having many classes allowed up tons of time for making art. However, there
was a tension: we needed money to make shows and the way to get money
was to teach more classes. We needed to move to a space that people would
actually come to.
PHOTO CREDIT: NANCY BEHALL
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