THE BARBETTE PROJECT
​Independent Research, 2020-2022

The Barbette Project is also the focus and the Final Major Project of my masters degree in Contemporary Circus Practices. As such, I have been conducting academic, historic and artistic research on it, and I'm using this page as a personal archive for some of that research.

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Barbette, Surrealism and Feminism ​(September 2020)

A surrealist photo collage series and accompanying video. Stav's body parts (as photographed by Asaf Sagi) and historical images of Barbette (mostly photographed by Man Ray and Madame d'Ora). Inspired by Surrealism, Pedro Almodovar and Maya Angelou. Made for Practice as Research in my MA.

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Movement Experiments (October 2020 R&D)

We experimented with Laban movement techniques and thought about what society and the media had taught us about stereotypical ways masculine and feminine should look like / move like. We then took those experiments and applied them towards our trapeze practices. Here's a glimpse of those experiments.

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Drag / Comedy Experiments (January 2021)

Drawing on juggler Benjamin Richter's "The Language of Objects", Laban movement technique and of course heavily influenced by drag acts I've viewed over a decade of living in New York City. A rough sketch of a drag character, a budding beginning for a drag act of my own. With a nod and a wink to "Some Like It Hot", where Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon were coached by Barbette himself.

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Barbette on Film

Edits of Barbette's only known surviving footage on film:
*Barbette in Jean Cocteau's surrealist film "Blood of a Poet", 1932
​*Barbette in a promotional video shot on Opening Night of the Broadway musical "Jumbo", November 16th, 1935