How Do We Exist In An Industrial Landscape?

Imagine a landscape filled with monsters. No, not some teen gothic fantasy land but something more industrial. A place where the crude utilitarian geometry of commerce overlays the softer edges of coastlines and hillsides. Now crowd some people into it. Give them jobs bending steel. Then sack them.

What's left?

If this seems a little dystopian for the circus, think again. When Brisbane-based ensemble Circa team up with the Illawarra-based Merrigong Theatre Company for an adventurous and avowedly hopeful world premiere production of Landscape With Monsters, the industrial hub of Wollongong will be athletically reimagined.

For 27-year-old acrobat Billie Wilson-Coffey the opportunity to bring the modern circus revival to the south coast represents an opportunity to explore a fundamental urban relationship. "How do humans interact or respond to this landscape of structure and buildings?" she wonders. "Y'know, it's kind of contrasting the harshness of the industrial against the softness of humans. There's, like, a really interesting contrast there."

"We're an ensemble, running, jumping, trusting one another, and so for us that is a sense of community and family."

Having grown up in the decidedly non-industrial Northern Rivers town of Mullumbimby, Wilson-Coffey is still able to view the cityscape with the eye of an outsider. As she explains, it's an illuminating perspective. "About four weeks ago after we'd been rehearsing with big structures and boxes and it was all coming together we were like, 'Well, this has all been fantastic but what does the show actually mean to you?' So for me it's about exploring the way that this kind of industrial landscape impacts on the natural beauty of the environment. I grew up in a small country town on the coast and so that really stands out to me. Y'know, how do we exist with it?"

However, the show is not all about Brisbane circus blow-ins reflecting on the 'Gong. Directed by Yaron Lifschitz, with lighting by Toby Knyvett and sound by Daryl Wallis, Landscape With Monsters is very much a locals' ode to their hometown, and despite the gloom often associated with the 'death of manufacturing' and its resulting social impact, the tone is consciously upbeat and energetic.

Reflecting on this, Billie Wilson-Coffey admits that the six Circa acrobats have been conscious not to step on Illawarra toes. "We had a creative development in Wollongong last year and since then there's been a lot of communication with the local artists about their knowledge and impressions, so hopefully toes have been avoided."

As is often the case when entire regions and communities undergo painful transitions, there is a natural tendency for introspection, for renewal and redefinition. For some this takes the form of a reflexive, defensive pride and for others a more reasoned out approach to the challenges and opportunities that uncertainty and change present. All of which makes you wonder how a physical theatre show like Landscape With Monsters can reflect this.

"We're an ensemble, running, jumping, trusting one another, and so for us that is a sense of community and family," says Wilson-Coffey. "I think that our connection on stage reflects the community in the audience. If we aren't there for one another on stage we fall and break.