The National Theatre is leading an effort to establish a contemporary circus industry in Nigeria, beginning with Circus in Motion: The Lagos Contemporary Circus Festival, scheduled to hold from October 3 to 4 at the National Theatre, Iganmu, Lagos.

The initiative seeks to build on skills that already exist among Nigerian performers while introducing them to contemporary circus techniques and international networks.

Speaking at a press conference ahead of the festival, MD/CEO of the National Theatre, Adetola Akerele said Nigeria had a pool of performers with the potential to develop professional careers in circus, but needed structures to help them hone their skills.

“There’s something there already,” Akerele said, referring to Nigeria’s existing performance talent. “For contemporary circus, it’s not about animals. It’s more about acrobatics, movement and dance.”

She said the festival was conceived after she encountered contemporary circus practices during an international trip and later connected with practitioners working across Africa.

According to Akerele, the project is intended to create opportunities for Nigerian performers to gain new skills, work with practitioners from other countries and eventually build careers in the sector.

“We don’t want to just copy and paste, do what they’re doing in Europe and bring it here. We want to do what is us,” she said.

The festival will bring together practitioners from Nigeria and other countries, including Ethiopia, Côte d’Ivoire and Switzerland, for performances and artistic exchange.

Co-founder and Artistic Director of Fekat Circus, Dereje Dange, said African countries already had forms of physical performance that could be recognised within the broader circus tradition.

He argued that traditional African dance, movement and other physical skills were often described as traditional arts rather than circus, despite sharing characteristics associated with the art form.

Chantal Djedje, founder of La Fabrique Culturelle, said Côte d’Ivoire faced a similar challenge when it began developing its circus sector.

She said many Ivorians initially associated circus with animals because that was the dominant image they had seen on television. 

However, the country’s experience showed that contemporary circus could attract different generations and create a new form of live entertainment.

For Nigeria, the organisers said the ambition extends beyond staging a two-day festival.

Akerele said the project was intended to become an annual programme, with the National Theatre hoping to make it bigger and bring in more performers from Africa and other parts of the world in subsequent editions.

The long-term ambition also includes developing Nigerian circus companies that can perform and tour independently.

“We are creating a new industry here, so it will be Nigerians who will be doing it,” Akerele said, adding that international collaboration was currently helping Nigerian practitioners learn and experiment with new ways of working.

The organisers also acknowledged that this year’s training programme is only an initial step. 

Akerele said she would have preferred a longer period of training, including a month of cross-training and exchange between Nigerian and international practitioners, but that this would require more funding.

Founder and Artistic Director of Wow FactorZ Initiative for Artistic and Creative Development, Samuel Udoh described the current engagement as more of a mentorship programme than a full masterclass.

He said some Nigerian artists already possessed skills in areas such as juggling and contortion but lacked the facilities and structures needed to develop them into sustainable careers.

The organisers said they had also begun engaging schools and communities ahead of the festival, with the aim of introducing young people to circus and showing them that physical performance could become more than recreational activity.

While the inaugural festival will be held in Lagos, Akerele said the National Theatre is interested in eventually taking the initiative to other parts of the country.

For now, Circus in Motion represents an early attempt to give contemporary circus a more formal place within Nigeria’s creative landscape, while connecting local performers to a wider African and international community.