Gandini Juggling

From 1991-1999 Gandini Juggling worked closely with British choreographer Gill Clarke (1954-2011). During this time they made a number of performances that merged principles of postmodern dance with juggling. Critic Mary Brennan noted of the company's first show nEither Either botH and... that it was "tuned into the deepest values of postmodern dance even as it sets out to celebrate some of our oldest entertainment skills"[4] and that, the "... group suddenly confront us with the whole dancey essence of what it is to-have objects/bodies moving in space, forming relationships with that space, with other bodies."

Regular performers in this period included Mike Day (co-founder of siteswap notation), Lindsey Butcher (founder of aerial dance company Gravity & Levity), Alix Wilding (co-founder of Feeding the Fish), and Ben Richter.

During this period Gandini Juggling also regularly presented their experiments in dance juggling at Juggling Conventions, such as the European Juggling Convention.[1]

In 2000 Gandini Juggling were commissioned to make a show for the Millennium Dome on London's Greenwich peninsula, as part of London's Millennium celebrations. at the same time they also built a large glass cube and, with musician and juggler John Blanchard, begun to explore bounce juggling within this.[5] They later went on to collaborate (in 2004) with John Blanchard and circus director John-Paul Zaccarini to make No Exit under the company name of K-DNK, supported by a Jerwood Award and London's National Centre for Circus Arts.[6]

In 2004 Gandini Juggling first appeared as part of the London International Mime Festival, presenting a double bill: Duet and Quartet.[7] Duet was Gandini Juggling's first narrative performance, exploring the relationship between a man and a woman. Quartet was a more formal choreography of juggling patterns.

Gandini Juggling's "fun and frothy"[8] Sweet Life was first performed in 2006. It was partly inspired by Federico Fellini's film La Dolce Vita, and it toured European city squares and other outdoor spaces for several years.[9]

Gandini Juggling returned to the London International Mime Festival in 2008 with Downfall. This was an exploration of light and dark, and contained a number of glow juggling sequences.[10] It also featured further experiments with the rhythmical sounds of bounce juggling.[11]

Between 2009 and 2012, Gandini Juggling were commissioned by England's National Theatre to make a series of performances for the venue's Watch This Space summer festival of street and outdoor performance. The first of these performances was Nightclubs in 2009, a large-scale show that was "an abstract and technically complex ensemble show which collected a group of markedly different performers and joined them by their unabashed love of spreadsheet juggling and mathematics."[12] This was followed in 2010 by Smashed, a Pina Bausch-inspired work "exploring conflict, lost love and quaint afternoon tea".[2] The original 30-minute outdoor version of Smashed was later reworked into a 60-minute indoor version for the London International Mime Festival.[13] Smashed went on to become the company's most successful work being performed over 300 times between 2010 and 2015. For 2011's Watch This Space the company presented Blotched, and then in 2012 Twenty/Twenty, a celebration of the company's 20th year.[14]

In 2014 Gandini Juggling premiered CLOWNS & QUEENS at London's Shoreditch Town Hall, a show that was "full of sex, but it is never sexy, examining the nature of lust with an almost forensic attention..."[15]

For the London International Mime Festival in 2015 Gandini Juggling premiered 4 x 4 (Ephemeral Architectures), a fusion of juggling and ballet, at the Royal Opera House in London's Covent Garden. 4 x 4 (Ephemeral Architectures) was directed by Sean Gandini and choreographed by Ludovic Ondiviela to the original composition Suspended Opus 69 by Nimrod Borenstein.

In 2011 with Circo Aereo Gandini Juggling co-produced Motet. This was directed by Circo Aereo's Maksim Komaro and was themed as a "history of juggling".[16]

In 2016 Gandini Juggling provided the skills ensemble for the English National Opera's production of Philip Glass's Akhnaten.[17] In the same year Gandini Juggling also worked with juggling company Plastic Boom to produce Water on Mars for the Edinburgh Fringe.[18]