Circus artists are under incredible pressure to be perfect. Perfect technique, perfect acts and perfect bodies. We must neither age nor show what we really look like. We hide our bodies in costumes that hide what we think we shouldn’t show. We train, starve and mold our bodies to reflect the image we believe audiences and bookers of the circus world want to see.
It’s all just an illusion, precisely the illusion of the perfectionism of the circus world.
It’s time to break with that notion.

The photo series “Beyond Beauty” aims to make the invisible. Show how it really looks like in a close-up without costumes. The pure body and the beauty that is in the woman’s body, which is still instrumentalized and dominated by a world of men.
“Beyond Beauty” – is an act of rebellion against body and age shaming in the field of performative and performing arts.

 

Artistic Director: Sabine Maringer
Photography: Ayni
Performer/Model: Maja Karolina Franke, Nina Dafert

Vienna, April 2023