Formed in 2015 as a collaboration between city wide venues and arts organisations passionate about celebrating Bristol as a City of Circus, the festival has become an important part of the performing arts landscape in Bristol and the UK.
To date we have delivered 5 festival programmes in 2015, 2017, 2019, 2021 and 2023. In October 2025 we will be celebrating our 10th anniversary and delivering our 6th festival programme.
Circus City 2023
In 2023 we presented The Outsider Edition: a constellation of shows exploring a common thread of human-object relations, transformation and interventions into the way people, bodies and situations can be seen and navigated. Each presented an opportunity for a reimagining of the familiar, human, scientific, physical, seen in a new light, as if with the eyes of an outsider.
2023 programme in numbers:
- 3791 people attended
- 39 performances and events were presented
- 67 artists performed
- 11 venues participated
- 28 volunteers supported
- 532 individuals played, danced, wrote, imagined and created at one of our workshops.
Circus city is the only dedicated circus festival in the UK which seems truly dedicated to bringing NEW and exciting contemporary circus to the UK
Audience Feedback 2023
The Outsider Edition
Our festival programme was as varied as ever with everything from research-driven performance-making (Darragh McCloughlin’s Stickman, Tom Cassani’s A Show of Hands & Iterations) and striking queer and neurodiverse and black led solo shows (Laura Murphy’s A Spectacle of Herself, Livia Kojo Alour’s Black Sheep), to pink punk gig-circus (Muovipussi’s Noise Juice), mind-bending physical storytelling and spectacle (Sawdust Symphony, Andrea Salustri’s Materia, Marina Cherry’s Only Bones) and retellings of classical literature (Ockham’s Razor’s Tess)
There were shows for young people and families with fire, music and mayhem (Tit For Tat’s BOOKS!, Whispering Woods & the Murmuration Choir’s The Shape of Belonging, Oh No George!) and presentations of brand new work in the making (Volt, Ruby & Charles) alongside a programme of workshops, talks, films and industry events.
To read more about previous festivals click the links below.
To make sure you are first in line to hear about our future programme and for access to early-bird ticketing make sure to sign up to our mailing list.
Nicole A’Court Stuart, Artistic Director
Circus City Festival & Handstand Arts