Atlas Festival: Cambodian-French circus in Belgium

[caption id="attachment_2015" align="alignright" width="240" caption="Phare Ponleu Selpak Cambodian Circus"]

[/caption] The Cambodian circus group Phare Ponleu Selpak Cirk appear in the ATLAS Festival on 16 April 2010. Phare Ponleu Selpak (PPS), meaning “the brightness of art”, originated in 1986 in Site 2 Refugee Camp on the Thai border. For the past 11 years, the circus school has welcomed kids and teenagers to train all day long in several circus disciplines: acrobatics, juggling, balancing, contortion, trapeze and clowning. Twenty of those kids are now young adults who have become outstanding professional artists performing in Cambodia and all around the world. Phare Ponleu Selpak Cirk from Battambang, Cambodia has been collaborating with the Collectif Clowns d’ailleurs et d’ici from France for some years. ATLAS festival is a part of the Extreme Convention, a convention where acrobats both professional and amateur and coming talent meet. It takes place in Anwerp, Belgium. Check out the European Tour 2010 of Putho! (French) production by Phare Ponleu Selpak Cirk, appearing in many venues and festivals in France, as well as Italy and Belgium, April-July 2010. Read (in French) the Le Fourneau blog with a history of circus in Cambodia and more…