DYNAMO Circus Festival 2025: a four-day tour de force of wildness, poetry, humour and magic
DYNAMO Circus Festival is back for its 6th edition from 18th to 21st of June in Odense, Denmark, packed with contemporary circus, music, celebration, community and unpredictable experiences. DYNAMO festival is a four-day-long tour de force of wildness, poetry, humour and magic. Its goal? To be a place for artists to meet from all over the world, as well as a gathering for families, tourists and audiences with a taste for the quirkier side of performing arts, filled with a circus attitude and party vibes. Here I share a glimpse of the festival edition’s programmed artistic choices, for those who will be there and those who will not. Two Big Tops, a lot of juggling, music and new circus discoveries, follow the Dynamo celebration of what circus can be: wild, moving, boundary-pushing and playful!
“This year we are going big with high artistic ambitions, spectacular performances and two Big Tops that will transform Odense harbour into a temporary circus dream town. We hope that guests from Odense, Funen, all of Denmark and abroad will come and take part in the party.”
Gry Lambertsen, Festival Director
The first edition of DYNAMO Circus Festival took place in August 2017, just half a year after the opening of DYNAMO. The festival was born out of the wish to share world-class circus from all over the world with the people of Odense. Over the years, the festival grew into a staple of Nordic events within the circus world and a hub for professionals, artists, creators, and programmers.
DYNAMO is an internationally renowned residency centre for contemporary arts based in the Odense harbour, producing nationally and internationally awarded circus shows and gathering people to attend try-outs, debuts and a selection of contemporary arts performances happening throughout the year.
The festival transforms the headquarters’ surroundings into a little circus town, and all performances take place here on the harbour, within a short walking distance from DYNAMO's main building. The four days celebrate DYNAMO’s artistic selection of contemporary circus, a recognition of the outstanding art that is being created in our field, and an invitation for audiences to let themselves be inspired, moved, and surprised.
Combining spectacular performances hosted outdoor and indoor, with music, creative workshops, a roller disco, delicious food, drinks and much more, the site design has a DIY approach with a very specific mood and aesthetic, inspired by the world of circus – on the move, wild, uncompromising, making the best out of every situation. The team have a dedication to sustainability and reusing materials, so the atmosphere at the festival is based on upcycling and recycling.
Utilising both the indoor space and outdoor area for hosting the productions, this year's edition, set at the Odense harbour, features two circus tents, Cirque Pardi!, with their show Low-Cost Paradise, and My!Laika with their show Winter.
DYNAMO Pro Seminar: a day about circus on tour, barriers and opportunities
Before the official opening on Thursday, the 18th, the festival begins with a one-day Professionals Focus Seminar on the development of circus and visions for touring of circus in Denmark. The event has been designed for Danish and international producers to foster networking, knowledge sharing, and relevant dialogues for the sector, promoting greater openness from venues and presenters to book contemporary circus in the region.
Three shows based in France open the Professionals’ Day: TIRA, a work in progress from La Barque Acide (FR), Low Cost Paradise by Cirque Pardi! (FR / ES / AR / NL) and Petroleo by Cie LPM – Los Putos Makinas (ES/FR)
TIRA, several nuances of a relationship
Still in a work-in-progress format, TIRA by the French-based company La Barque Acide is an introspective visual exploration of a couple and their fragility, oscillating between tenderness and manipulation, sensuality and violence. On stage, two circus artists trained at Ésacto’lido, Celeste Funghi, specialised in aerial rope, and Carla Carnerero Huertas, diabolist, tell the story of life, even if it is sometimes not what it should be or what we would like it to be. Their research focuses on what they have in common, the manipulation of different kinds of rope: aerial rope, diabolo rope and various types of rope differing in length and thickness. Through minimalist scenography, composed of lights and sounds, TIRA invites the audience to dive into the minds of the two characters, to share their doubts, desires and contradictions. Here, non-verbal communication – gestures, glances, subtle movements – becomes a language, revealing intimacy and tension, also a kind of relatable romantic playfulness. The full-length 50-minute performance will debut in October 2025.
A tent reflecting society through a circus lense: Low Cost Paradise
The numerous French collective Cirque Pardi has been touring with this production since 2019, all over the place, bringing this tribute to human fragility. They describe the kind of feeling that resembles the show as “a cry of joy by fatigue”. With traditional circus elements such as a clown, sequential circus acts in a circular space and a live orchestra, the show’s contemporary temperament relies on its creative use of looking at upside-down reality, criticisms of western society, through a circus lense. Low-Cost Paradise is a reaction to the paradoxes of human existence, mixing various registers, the tragic, the comical, the absurd, as human life is in this chaotic era. Combining stumbling acts with live music, “any resemblance to reality is not at all a coincidence”. The audience is invited to over an hour full of surprising changeable contexts, as if the company’s tent is just reflecting with humour some sketches of the society we are all in. Low-cost paradise highlights the circus of life and the life in circus, as the two universes complement each other, co-existing in their absurdity.
Petroleo: playful neon nerd juggling with incredible ideas and great humour
Co-produced by DYNAMO Workspace, the 2023 edition of DYNAMO Festival hosted this show as a work in progress, and now the full version is ready to be staged. With this duo, the French company LPM – Los Putos Makinas explores the infinite possibilities the juggling ring object offers, applying its bouncing playfulness to many multicoloured flexible juggling rings. LPM is a collective of circus juggling artists, initially co-founded around the Piti Peta Hofen show, a trio with Andrés Torres Díaz, Lucas Castelo Branco and Johannes Bauhofer. Since 2017, their full-on show has been performed over 150 times worldwide. Juan Duarte Mateos joined the team to create the following Tutti Frutti, and Gonzalo Fernández Rodríguez joined for the duo Petroleo. The company's signature is at the service of satire. In a burlesque register, they coexist in the world of the absurd to denounce the inconsistency that conditions our lives. In Petroleo, the juggling is evocative and involves designing multiple worlds. They connect the history of the plastic material (the ring's essence) to the current scene of two jugglers confronting each other like children on a stage. Combat, irreverent solutions, everything could happen from the absurdly connected minds of the jugglers Andrès Torress Diaz and Gonzalo Fernàndez Rodriguez.
On Thursday 19th, the Dynamo festival's official opening is followed by two outdoor performances, Go Through the window and run by Cie Happy Face (FR), B.O.B.A.S by the Cia Jimena Cavalletti (ES / DK / AR). To end the evening, inside the tent of My!Laika (DE / IT) they stage their show, Winter.
Go through the window and run: options for surviving chaos when juggling means control
Another juggling partner duo for questioning how to contain life's problems! From their website, the narrative starts like this: “At first glance, everything seems fine. We're in control, we're confident. We move forward, confident and true to ourselves. BUT (because there must be a ‘but’ otherwise it gets boring and tedious. That's why we write it in capital letters, because it's important) it couldn't last, it explodes. Nothing stands still anymore.” This is why their show becomes like a race towards deliverance or finding a way to escape fate. Not giving in to failure and searching for a solution at all costs. When the situation spirals out of control, and suddenly fears resurface, and doubts arise, what is left of us? Where can we find the energy to fight and stay together? Philosophically speaking, juggling is always a thing. Somewhere between juggling, dance and theatre, they seek to express the small fears of life. They juggle as they dodge, as one avoids obstacles, searching for a way to get through, to confront the reality that surrounds them.
B.O.B.A.S. irreverence to death for making fun of life
B.O.B.A.S. is a circus performance of three female clowns with music. The three clowns Lisa Madsen, Laia Sales, and Jimena Cavalletti compose a humble orchestra specialised in playing at funeral ceremonies, but, of course, in the show, everything goes wrong, and neither the priest nor the deceased show up. Mixing the registers of physical theatre, clownerie and street show dynamics, the audience becomes part of their weird drama. Caught in an embarrassing and unexpected wait, the slapstick comedy begins, since the band has to come up with something. With music as their salvation, they transform the tragic situation into a chain of comical mishaps and take the opportunity to make us laugh at life. And death.
WINTER by My!Laika, an existential great avalanche of images
My!Laika is a circus company which was founded in 2009 to create absurd and tridimensional collages of movement, music and image. Their shows are the results of long and twisted association chains, blending their circus disciplines and music affections into the context of an amoral theatre, avoiding linear narration and immediate comprehension. Winter flows inexorably, as an interior winter flows with ontological inquisitions on death, climate and the consistency of a Calippo ice cream. With a self-irony typical of kunst-cirque, the show takes the drama out of the hopeless sensation of being frozen on this planet, and questions itself to find a way out from its unusual spectres. Their style is unique; the absurdity of consequences and contrasts on stage will stay with you for a long time, and it is impossible not to laugh.
Friday the 20th is the day of Mama Calypso and the Sweethearts concert (DK / IT / UK), the show Opa Fashion by Grind Art Club/Vejde & Mischa (SE), followed by , followed by the intimate pupper theatre experience for three spectators at a time by Madame Paulette, The Sinner (ES) and to close the day, by the legendary Party Tricks with Dan Le Man (AU), Kaisa Ling (EE) and Dj Bitch Muchannon (DK) a must for every Dynamo festival community lover.
Opa Fashion: a circus hybrid story on brotherhood, heritage and creative intuition
After its debut in April 2025, Opa Fashion is staged in Odense by DYNAMO Festival, and it will be a great chance to see what is going on with the cyr wheel of Vejde Grind after his previous previous work called H O M A N (finalist of CircusNext 2020-2021) created in collaboration with Collectif Malunés. This time, Vejde co-created a circus performance with his multi-instrumentalist brother Mischa, where the fusion of circus, music, and technology creates a dynamic world where sound and movement are in constant dialogue. Two brothers on stage, one musician and one circus performer, and as a sound designer and external eye, Niklas Blomberg of Muovipussi. What could it be? Two artists, two Cyr wheels and loads of drums. Opa Fashion is a hybrid circus performance rich in unique instrument inventions, technological wonders, vocals and dance. Mischa Grind channels his expertise in folk music and sends waves of sound through his brother Vejde’s body, which transforms into fluid, rhythmic movements before being released through the spinning Cyr wheel. The amplified wheel, with its intricate sound design, generates astonishing sounds that reflect back into the performance, weaving together a continuous loop of sound and motion. A central feature of the performance is the string-wheel, a unique hybrid of a double bass and a Cyr wheel. This experimental instrument, combined with live looping, creates soundscapes that immerse the audience in the performance. The brothers improvise within these sensory loops, creating moments that are emotionally resonant, visually stunning, and entirely unique. In the project, traditional folk music and contemporary circus converge in a boundless exploration of brotherhood's telepathy. Playful improvisation, intense physical presence, tasteful visuals and clothing, all coloured by a mutual traditional heritage, shaped by growing up together as siblings in a family of six, in the countryside of Sweden.
Dan Le Man is a professional performer, host and pitch coach from Australia now based in Estonia. He has performed for 20+ years on the street, stage and ships. He also owns a red curtain vaudeville-style theatre/bar in Tallinn called Heldeke!, whilst also running yearly festivals such as Tallinn Fringe and the Estonian Circus Convention. As in every previous edition of DYNAMO Festival, with Party Tricks, he invites people on stage to show their more private, weird performative abilities, and each night has a winner voted for by the audience.
Saturday, the outdoor stage is open for the local scene, LPM comes back on stage with the frankly exhilarating ignorance of Rapido Y Buracha, and the festival closes with a concert from a band from Denmark, Smag På Dig Selv, and a DJ afterparty.
60SECONDS and CIRCUS CINEMA SHORTS in a loop every day at DYNAMO Festival
DYNAMO Festival hosts the short movies selection by the German CircusDanceFestival and opens each loop of shorts with the five 60Seconds selected clips of this edition’s DYNAMO open call. As a jury member of both selections, I am looking forward to seeing these clips and short movies hosted inside the venue’s iconic trailer at DYNAMO's festival site! The three 60Seconds top finalists are: Hold Fast by Director Ken Fanning, Ireland, Detalj by Director Alex Hinchcliffe, Sweden, and Kala kuivalla maalla - Like a fish on dry land by Director Josa Kölbel, Germany.
After Dynamo, the selection of clips and short movies is hosted again in August by the OFF Odense Movie Festival. The short movies programme is dedicated to experimental circus in the medium of film. Using various visual narratives, it explores new film techniques and aesthetics. The six international short films have been selected from over 200 submissions and deal with floating at lofty heights, the relationship with one's own body and the visually focused perception of spaces.
Purgatorio by Stephanie Miracle, Auden Lincoln-Vogel and Philip Rabalais (DE/US) – 6 min
You can't win a game you don't know how to play, but you also can’t lose. A Haunting universe of gym-like rooms open and keeps unfolding, while the dance and game begins. Purgatorio is a site-specific dance film and an experimental fusion of choreography, cinematography and sound.
Choreography Stephanie Miracle | Cinematography & Editing Auden Lincoln-Vogel | Sound-Design Philip Rabalais
Walls Beneath Our Feet by Antti Suniala (FI) – 5 min
This circus short film explores urban life and space from unexpected angles and is inspired by the Pasila Street Art District in Helsinki. Impressive images and the free body language of the artists of Race Horse Company bear witness to current debates and are a call for a better future.
Direction Antti Suniala | Director of Photography Christoffer Collina | 2nd Camera Antti Suniala | Edit & colour grading Petri Erkkilä | Music RKKK| Circus artists Rauli Dahlberg & Teemu Skön | Production Antti Suniala & RaceHorse Company
Ode Maritima by Fu Le (PT) – 6 min
The poem “Naval Ode” by Fernando Pessoa is embodied by a mysterious and suspended dance, imbued with nostalgic desire, which swells like a sail. It captures the movement of separation between the dock and the ship, and thus the distance between the inside and the outside, between the other and the self.
Direction Fu Le | Choreography & Dance Magalie Lanriot, Roel Q Seeber | Rigging Hartmut Reichel, Roel Q Seeber | Production assistant Olivia Sander
NOON by Elaine Briant, Joana Martinho (FR/LU) – 5 min
NOON shows a very specific handstand technique in a duo with block manipulation. Two similar-looking handstand artists explore the relationship with their blocks in a playful atmosphere. The visual aesthetic is inspired by geometric shapes, shadows, light and natural materials such as wood, skin and stone.
Filming & Editing Isak Stockas, Joel Roxendal
Unboxing by Danila Bim (US/BR) – 6 min
In Unboxing, the only way out is turning to the inside. A woman finds herself on a surreal journey of self-discovery. Suspended by her hair, she utilises poetic and acrobatic movement to delve into concepts of individuation. It reflects the inner walls of the mind and the search to break free.
Direction Danila Bim, Jimmy Slonina | Writing, Editing, Production & Performance Danila Bim | Director of Photography Mike Wynn | Props Thom Rubino, Danila Bim | Production Assistant Ryan Mitchell | Music William Lawrance| Bass Guitar Alistair Scott | Backing Vocals Stephanie Lawrence| Drums & Percussion Thom Mills| Vocals & Guitar William Lawrence | Mix Engineer Theo Verney | Mastering Engineer Julian Tardo | Pictures Roberto Reyes
ANASA by Maja Zimmerlin, Thomas Delord (CH/DE) – 4 min
Is this an earthquake inside or outside? This film is about the connection with matter and its dissolution into earth, stone, sand and sea. Dry flowers push themselves out of the sand. Finally, there is only floating. Inside and outside.
Direction & Writing Thomas Delord, Maja Zimmerlin | Choreography Maja Zimmerlin | Film & Editing Thomas Delord | Performance & Creation Aurore Allo, Antonio Terrones, Zoé Leduc, Lito Anastasopoulou, Kritonas Anastasopoulos| Music Thomas Delord, Maja Zimmerlin
DYNAMO Circus Festival is supported by The Danish Arts Foundation, Municipality of Odense, Region Syddanmark, Spar Nord Foundation and William Demant Foundation.
PROGRAM - DYNAMO CIRCUS FESTIVAL 2025
WEDNESDAY 18/6
17.00-17.45 TIRA – La Barque Acide (FR) – work in progress
19.00-20.40 LOW COST PARADISE Cirque Pardi!
21.00-21.45 PETROLEO Cie LPM – Los Putos Makinas
THURSDAY 19/6
16.00-16.10 Official festival opening!
16.10-16.50 GO THROUGH THE WINDOW AND RUN – Cie Happy Face
17.00-17.45 PETROLEO Cie LPM – Los Putos Makinas
18.15-19.10 B.O.B.A.S Cia Jimena Cavalletti
19.30-21.10 LOW COST PARADISE Cirque Pardi!
21.30-22.45 WINTER My!Laika
FRIDAY 20/6
14.30-15.10 GO THROUGH THE WINDOW AND RUN – Cie Happy Face
15.30-16.45 CONCERT MAMA CALYPSO AND THE SWEETHEARTS
17.00-18.00 OPA FASHION Grind Art Club/Vejde & Mischa
18.00-19.00 B.O.B.A.S Cia Jimena Cavalletti
19.30-21.10 LOW COST PARADISE Cirque Pardi!
19.30-21.30 THE SINNER (ES)
21.30-22.45 WINTER My!Laika
23.00-01.00 PARTY TRICKS WITH DAN LE MAN (AU)
SATURDAY 21/6
12.00-12.40 Cirkus Tværs
13.00-13.40 GO THROUGH THE WINDOW AND RUN – Cie Happy Face
14.00-15.00 B.O.B.A.S Cia Jimena Cavalletti
15.00-16.15 ÅBEN SCENE / OPEN STAGE
16.30-17.30 OPA FASHION Grind Art Club/Vejde & Mischa
18.00-19.40 LOW COST PARADISE Cirque Pardi!
19.30-21.30 THE SINNER
20.00-21.15 WINTER My!Laika
21.30-22.00 RAPIDO Y BURACHA Cie LPM – Los Putos Makinas
22.00-23.00 CONCERT: SMAG PÅ DIG SELV
23.00-02.00 Afterparty & DJ