CHENNAI : Act 1. The stage is set with two parallel poles. An acrobat climbs one of them with ease, and pauses on top to catch his breath. His gaze, however, is fixed on the second pole. He is preparing to make a jump. As the audience waits with bated breath, in a split second, he lands gracefully, upside-down on the pole. We erupt into an applause, unaware that it was only a warm up to what was in store for us.
Five acts by 10 acrobats kept us at the edge of our seats for the next 30 minutes. We were at the open auditorium of VGP Universal Kingdom, where an independent group of acrobats had travelled all the way from Shanxi, China, to put up a ‘Chinese Acrobatics’ show. It was brought to VGP by Los Angeles-based Mirage Entertainment. The acrobats performed to traditional Chinese music, which built into faster crescendos. And with each act, the acrobats’ stunts got more and more daring.
They used poles, hoops, silks hanging from a rope, and Chinese yogos as props. In a conversation with the acrobats after their performance, Sunny Zhang Jian, the choreographer, explained that it took them years of practice to get perfect with each prop. “The yogos alone take us about six years to learn, and we practice it every day for three hours in the morning and evening,” he shared.
Chinese yogos are slightly different from the smaller yo-yos in India. The five women who performed their act with yogos, threw them in air, and with choreographed perfection, caught them back on their yogo ropes. The hoops, a common prop in most acrobatic performances, were placed over smaller ones in this act, and acrobats passed through them one after the other with ease. Despite Chennai’s scorching heat at 3 pm, there wasn’t a slight drop in their energy. “The heat really is the only difference between performing here and in China. The first few days were hard, but we’re getting used to it. Besides, the people of Chennai are very enthusiastic and it makes us want to perform here,” said Jenny Huang Ran Shu, who stunned the audience with her duo performance in air with silk ropes.
Back home, all 10 acrobats, travel and perform as an independent group, and are well-known for their lineage. They are fourth and fifth generation acrobats who have been trained by their parents, uncles and aunts, from a tender age of seven. “Within the 10 of us too there’s a sense of community, because our families know each other well. And this is first time we’re performing outside China, so we naturally bond more, especially since we don’t know the language here,” explained Sunny.
They arrived in Chennai on April 14, and started performing on April 21 after a week of rehearsals. What brings the group alive are not just their flips, jumps, and pyramid formations, but also the way they look out for each other, ensuring safety of the group. Xiao Long shared that the aerial act by him and Jenny, is an example of how they’ve learnt to communicate non-verbally to ensure that the grip is tight, and spins are at a comfortable speed. “There are mistakes sometimes. But it’s inevitable, and the audience here and back at home are very encouraging. So it pushes us to go on,” said Xiao.
Keeping the art alive
These 10 artists are well-known for their lineage. They are fourth and fifth generation acrobats who have been trained by their parents, uncles and aunts, from childhood.