Flight
Slipping the surly bonds.
My aerial work runs the gamut:
…from twisted and disturbing (and naked and masked), as at PURE with The Empire S.N.A.F.U Restoration Project
…to graceful and melancholy, as in Hunger Dreams and scattered undocumented performances at Pan9 and other places
…to dangerous and delightful, as at the The Roxy and the now-shuttered Avalon.
Since 2002 my team and I have brought joy to countless spectators in nightclubs, theatres, halls, derelict stripmalls, decrepit mills, domesticated factories, and rehabilitated bathhouses.
The system pictured here is called the Gates Device. You may be better advised just to look at the pictures if you are curious about its workings, but I will attempt a description for the incorrigibly verbal:
The Gates Device consists of a swivelling sheave (typically a Harken 1586) which is rigged a minimum of fourteen feet above the floor, through which is rove a length of rope. One end of the rope terminates in an eye, either spliced or knotted. Loops of two-inch webbing are attached to the other half of the rope at what appear to be (but in fact are not) irregular intervals. The final element of the system is a bidirectional foot harness which is worn by the aerialist. To perform aerial maneuvers, the aerialist clips his or her harnessed foot to the eye, and pulls on the opposing length of rope. The sheave supplies a 2-1 advantage, making it comparatively easy to leave the ground. The two-inch hand loops offer the aerialist a method of staying in the air without having to maintain a dead grip on the bare line. Of course, the actual kinaesthetic possibilities of this system are almost impossible to describe…
