Episode #19-Part 1: The Creation of An Aerialist with Veronica Blair

Please won’t you be a Patreon?: http://www.patreon.com/theartistathlete How does an aerialist get made? According to aerialist Veronica Blair, it’s all about hard work and sparkly costumes! Veronica started her acrobatic career at the age of 14 with Make*A*Circus, and studied Chinese Acrobatics under Master Lu Yi at the San Francisco Youth Circus. She began her career at the age of 17, which at the time, made her one of the youngest professional African-American trapeze artists in the U.S. She was personally hired by Cedric Walker as a resident aerialist for UniverSoul Circus. During her five years with Universoul, she had the privilage working with celebrated and prominent artists including trapeze great LaNorma Fox and the Gérard Fasoli. I split this interview into two episodes: In this episode, Veronica shares the stories on her career path to becoming a professional aerialist. In next week’s episode, Veronica talks how her experiences launched her into an investigation of the history of people of color in American circus, ultimately leading her to create an ongoing work called the Uncle Junior Project. If you’re a Patreon, you have access to both episodes right now! This podcast is dedicated to CIRCUS. Aerialist, Shannon McKenna interviews guests from acrobats in Cirque du Soleil to circus therapists and everyone in between. Learn the backstage lives of those who flip, twist, sparkle, and shine under the big top. Shannon McKenna is an internationally recognized circus performer and coach. For the past decade, she has been a freelance artist: giving workshops and classes across 7 countries and worked on both traditional and contemporary circus shows in the US, Portugal, Germany, and Australia including the Shrine Circus and SOAP. She holds a BFA from NYU's Tisch School of the Arts with a concentration on post-modern physical theater (how's that for a mouthful?). She founded The Artist Athlete in 2018 as a means to produce educational materials about circus arts including a line of e-books to help aerial artists train safely and a podcast in which she interviews experts in the industry about their careers. If you're reading this, you're probably listening to it. Thank you! She currently lives in whichever circus community is the warmest. Find her online: www.theartistathlete.com Facebook: The Artist Athlete Instagram: @the_artist_athlete